Best approach to unstructured service requests

[magnushedlu]

Hi community,

So we are about to implement ServiceNow ITSM and got a question about how to best manage the need for registering ad-hoc or unstructured Service Requests. 

Use case 1: A user emails the system and a Universal Request is created. The 1st line support group concludes that this is a request for a service that is not matching a existing item in the catalog. What to do?

Use case 2: A service team is assigned an Incident from 1st line support. But when analyzing this they confirm it is not an Incident really but rather a request for service. The service is not defined as an item in the catalog. What to do?

My proposed way of managing this would be to have one or more items in the catalog that they can use to catch these undefined needs. Although I think it my users will be confused by the fact that the system will create one REQ, RITM and a SCTSK item when all they practically need is one task representing the need.

Any input from anyone on how this has been resolved? I assume that most organizations have similar use cases.

[Community Alums]

For that purpose, I would typically build an IT-4-IT generic request, this would be visible only to ITSM-roled users, and basically allows them to pick an assignment group (the AD team) a description of their needs, and whatever other applicable info. Then they submit it (usually without approval).

The first task could be 'triage request' or an 'approval' and a second task could be 'handle request'.

Further, you could opt to allow manual creation of tasks on a requested item, but that can get really tricky as you only want it for 'ad-hoc' requests and not for requests with a flow.

[magnushedlu]

Hi Niels,

Thanks, that solution sounds practical and inline with my own thinking.
I’m not really a fan of creating tasks for these type of requests but perhaps there are no good way around working with catalog tasks? For a simple request for service I would have preferred having the team working on the RITM directly and create tasks only if needed.