Customer Service Agents can not see all Cases

[Kenneth Zabrisk]

We are finding that certain Cases do not appear for our customer service agents/managers and we cannot figure out why - because we have intentionally restricted nothing.   By and large we are running OOB for CSM.

As posted elsewhere on this forum, we've looked for ACLs that would block access to certain Case records, but we haven't found any in our system.

We've traced the SQL for the displayed records (see below) and what we have noticed is that the SQL for those users who see a restricted set of results includes "AND task0.`a_ref_3` IS NULL".   But, we don't know what a_ref_3 is nor why the restriction applies for some users but not all.

Thanks in advance for any help.

13:05:49.388: Time: 0:00:00.000 for: gtlprod_1[glide.30] SELECT ... FROM task task0 WHERE task0.`sys_class_name` IN ('sn_customerservice_case','csm_order_case') AND task0.`number` LIKE 'CS004939%' AND task0.`a_ref_3` IS NULL /*...*/ 

13:05:49.392: Time: 0:00:00.000 for: gtlprod_1[glide.31] SELECT ... FROM task task0 WHERE task0.`sys_class_name` IN ('sn_customerservice_case','csm_order_case') AND task0.`number` LIKE 'CS004939%' AND task0.`a_ref_3` IS NULL ORDER BY task0.`state` DESC limit 0,20 /*...*/ 

13:05:49.399: Time: 0:00:00.001 for: gtlprod_1[glide.1] SELECT ... FROM (((task task0 LEFT JOIN core_company core_company1 ON task0.`a_ref_1` = core_company1.`sys_id` ) LEFT JOIN sys_user sys_user2 ON task0.`a_ref_4` = sys_user2.`sys_id` ) LEFT JOIN sys_user sys_user3 ON task0.`assigned_to` = sys_user3.`sys_id` ) WHERE task0.`sys_class_name` IN ('sn_customerservice_case','csm_order_case') AND task0.`sys_id` IN ('a0fd1eaadbd9449048f22feb0b96193c' , '5e6e5e2edb954c908f7055384b961987' , 'e44f92a2db1d449048f22feb0b961925' , '411f9e62dbd54c908f7055384b96199d' , '15af1226dbd54c908f7055384b961999') /*...*/ 

[The SN Nerd]

Is your account hierarchy setup correctly?

Case access is restricted based on how this is configured.

Consumer Agents (dealing with the general public) should only be able to see all cases with no relationships to Accounts, and Customer Service Agents (dealing with third parties and external organizations) to those accounts which they have relationships with.

https://docs.servicenow.com/bundle/london-customer-service-management/page/product/customer-service-...

[Kenneth Zabrisk]

Paul, we are a small company so we don't make the Consumer/Customer distinction on the agent side.  So, we are pursuing your suggestion to determine if we are a bit cross-wise with ServiceNow's expectations.

Was still hoping that someone could tell me what a_ref_3 was pointing to in the task table and/or why it was in the Case query for the agents.

[The SN Nerd · Accepted solution]

It probably isn't ACL but Query rules that are hiding the records:

Try disabling these until you get the results you want.

Once you have the results you want, try to understand what the rule is doing and see if you can fix it through configurations, then re-enable. Or not, up to what works for you.