What is a Help Desk?

The term help desk has many variations in its definition, including:

A source of technical support for hardware or software. Help desks are generally staffed by people that can either solve the problem directly or direct the problem to a department that can help the inquirer.

Sometimes a help desk is a call center that handles questions about products. Help desk questions can also be a live chat service or an email based inquire and respond system.

While most help desks are external, in that external callers access the help desk to resolve their problems, some companies are large enough to maintain their own internal help desk functions.

A help desk is often characterized by single point of entry for all user inquiries and problems about a particular information system. Frequently a voice automated help desk telephone system allows users to navigate themselves to arrive at the correct department.

The most common users of a help desk are the technical support centers for computer or electronic components and software programs. Often help desks are oriented around problem issues, such as, installation, trouble shooting, technical support and the like.

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What is a Help Desk Software?

Help desk software provides the means to log in problems and track them until solved. It also provides the management information regarding support activities.

Most help desk software applications will provide management reports to track problems and inquiries.

As you might imagine, there is a great deal of variance between help desk software solutions. Also, you will find a substantial difference in cost for your help desk software programs.

Some programs simply function as an information storage and reporting mechanism, Other help desk programs provide extensive support for the operators by detailing canned solutions to various problems then offering an array of managerial reports.

Simple helpdesk software programs act as basic Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems in that they are spreadsheet-based databases that assign sequential reference numbers for each inquiry.

Help desk software programs that are more comprehensive integrate a wide array of solutions and reports to rapidly achieve a favorable outcome for both users and help desk staff, Some help desk software programs incorporate an artificial intelligence mode in that they can actually learn based on previous encounters.

Read more about help desk software programs.