Creating a Ticket
Click here to see if you already have a ticket for your concern.
Often when there's an issue, our first thought is to reach out to someone in IT. That's a good thing, but many times, you'll hear us start with some basic questions, so here's a quick review of what we'll likely ask. And, when in doubt, restarting your pc before submitting a ticket is always a good thing to try.
NOTE: Please do not "cc" specific IT staff on tickets. Due to the new ticketing system and its functionality, any IT staff member who "owns" a ticket and is added in the cc field will cause every communication on the ticket to come in in triplicate to that person's email account. If you wish to alert a specific person about a ticket, please send a separate email to them (ideally, with the ticket number), or reach out via Teams and reference the ticket. Thank you!
Things to do/check before submitting a new ticket
What follows are some questions we'll likely ask. So, if you can answer them in your initial ticket, this will cut down on delays caused by us asking for the info, and then waiting for your response:
- Have you done a full restart or shutdown and then power up of your system since you encountered this problem?*
- If you have - tell us. If you haven't, please try this.
- How long has this been happening?
- Are any other people who are experiencing the same issue?
- Example: If it's a problem opening a file in SharePoint, can a coworker open that file? Are they using the same process (e.g., the same browser)?
- If this is happening in one app/location, have you already tried a similar app or different location?
- Example: if you have the problem on SharePoint and you're using Chrome, have you tried to do the same thing, but using Edge?
- If the problem involves a file or a website, please include a link (not just the name of the file) to the file or site.
- Unfortunately, we have a lot of file, folder, and library name duplication, and many things that are just similar. And we haven't memorized every location of every file and folder. We can dig. And maybe find the right one. Or the wrong one. Or we can ask. But it's always faster and less confusing if you include the link. This helps cut down on delays and the chance that we don't find the one you're referencing.
- Screenshots are wonderful, but please be sure to include more than a small, cropped image. Often, to identify the problem, we'll need to see the full app window (showing all the menu options and/or the address bar showing the location), and if the image is too cropped, we won't be able to get the info we need without asking for a new screenshot or we'll need to get into your pc to find the info ourselves. Basically -- context is often important, and extremely cropped screenshots rarely give us context.
*Many issues can be resolved by this. There are too many programs, too many updates, too many things that can change (moving from wifi to plugged in, taking the pc home from the office, updates downloaded but only half-installed, memory utilization, temporary lack of network connection, etc.) to always pinpoint the cause of an (what may be a temporary) issue. Sometimes we can, but sometimes just getting things back up and running is the priority. If you're the only person experiencing the issue, and it's something that has worked fine for you in the past, this will, 90+% of the time, be one of our first, if not the first, request of you. Save anything you have open and do a full restart.
For fun: How to check up time on your system
If you'd like to see how long your pc thinks it's been since a restart and you're unsure how to check, you can see how long it's been up by following these steps:
- Open Task Manager.
There is more than one way to open it. If you're unsure how, an easy way is to right click in the system tray (any open area that is not on an icon), and in the menu that pops up, left click Task Manager.
- When you have the details open and you can see the tabs, click the Performance tab. Near the bottom (if you're showing the CPU details screen) you will see Up time. Note: Make sure that when you're in Task Manager, the details are visible. If not, click More details at the bottom left.
If you believe that the visible up time is incorrect, there is a setting on the pc that could be interfering with this. We can change that setting (for future checks). There's also the possibility that you told the pc to restart, but something prevented it from doing that (e.g., it stalls because of an open app). Instead of staying on the "do you want to restart anyway?" screen, the laptop sometimes aborts the restart request and just reloads your login prompt. If you didn't watch the full process (if you walked away or looked away from your screen at the right moment), you might believe you've restarted, but your pc has not actually restarted. This is not uncommon. Regardless of the reason, your pc last processed a full restart when the timer was at zero, so, for the pc, that up time is correct to the best of its knowledge.
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