Closed Bug 957638 Opened 10 years ago Closed 10 years ago

Use different tag for auto-escalation

Categories

(support.mozilla.org :: Questions, task, P3)

Tracking

(Not tracked)

RESOLVED FIXED
2014Q1

People

(Reporter: atopal, Assigned: rrosario)

References

Details

(Whiteboard: u=contributor c=questions p=1 s=2014.2)

Originally we intended to use the "escalate" tag for hard questions the community could not answer and we designed the mechanics around that. Once a question is marked as "escalate", we don't show it by default anymore. In addition to that, community contributors who like to work on hard questions can follow that tag and grow into a 2nd level support role. 

Since then we have also used the "escalate" tag to mark questions that have not been replied to within 24 hours. Unfortunately that doesn't work quite as well. Those questions might not actually be hard, but now they are also hidden by default. In addition, people who would like to see hard questions and follow the "escalate" tag, see unrelated questions that might not be hard at all, but maybe off-topic.

On top of that, it also clouds our view towards the status of the forum. Because we are using the same tag for hard cases and those not-replied-to cases, we can't tell anymore what the communities reply rate is (aka what would the reply rate be without the help desk), but we also can't tell how many of the questions in the forums are "too hard" for the community.

For those reasons, I'm proposing that we tag those "auto-escalated" questions with another tag. My proposal would be "NewEscalation". In the future we might want to auto-escalate follow-ups where people have been waiting for more than 24 hours and this way we could distinguish more cases.

Thoughts?
Changing the tag name used should be pretty easy and straightforward.
Whiteboard: u=contributor c=questions p= s=2014.2 → u=contributor c=questions p=1 s=2014.2
Thoughts ?

I was looking forward towards a time when we may in fact have 3 or 4 case types where threads are escalated, mostly automatically, and expecting these cases to have differing tags.
1  - initial delay, 
2  - subsequent delay 
3  - manual escalate 
?4 - stalled question 

1) Initial Delay - As done currently. With the tag *escalate*. See bug XXXX .
It may even be worth splitting and adding a sub category.
It will not be possible to introduce a 12 or 3hr escalation or whatever without having a 24/7 HelpDesk facility, but we do already have good 24/7 tier 1 cover.

1a) Initially it was intended to escalate after 12 hours,
 and thus help with meeting the answered within 24 hours target. That *was* initially implemented at 12hrs. 
 In my opinion this is best aimed at tier 1 and so definitely should not be hidden. 
 HelpDesk is not going to be around 24/7 to deal with these in a timely manner anyhow. 
  
1b) As currently happens escalate after 24 hours. 
 This is to try to hit the 72 hours reply response. 
 These apparently need the Zendesk ticket and are currently then hidden. 
 (I would suggest consider: adding to the escalate & tier 2 view,
   but not  hiding from tier 1 view until the 72 hour point)   

2) Subsequent Delay - Escalation if a question is left without a further response.
Again this *was* initially implemented.
This is no longer done by automated tagging. Apparently this was thought essential to prevent "dropping the ball" and to ensure a rapid response cycle, on the forum. I imagine this will be re-introduced as it will be a core target for 2014. When reintroduced maybe consider as in 1b above. Some of these threads may well be easy to answer once requested information is provided. They may be cases  of dropping the ball, if not then within 72 hours Tier 2 can take over.

3) Manual EscalateWe have a tag or will have


  


BTW 
Not sure but is tag entry case insensitive.

Maybe we need to consider the single Offtopic tag at the same time. 
That is indeed an escalation and has two main categories treated entirely differently. 
1) Low Relevance:
Subjects that are not really directly relevant  and being answered as a courtesy.Then locked.
2) Specialist:
Important and needing specialist advice from somewhere else within Mozilla.
N.B. Questions relating to our other main products are NOT currently differentiated in AAQ view.
oops it submits comments on pressing the space or Return  sometimes !!
Continued

3) Manual Escalate We have a tag or will have.
This part needs guidelines rather than development action.
Let's ensure we try to get genuine hard questions escalated. Ones needing tier 2 support. Not just ones that the first tier 1 contributor seeing it is unable to answer.
Remember we  have made it is very difficult to find questions by category product or subject content. This will not make it as easy for tier 1 specialists to find questions they want to answer.

4) Stalled question
Either because a contributor wishes to hand this on, or due to lack of response. Needs tier 2 attention.

The first two categories can be handled automatically.
Thanks for the feedback on this John. We've done away with 1/1a, the tier2/Helpdesk SLA is to make sure everyone gets a response in 72 hours. Cases escalated after 24 hours should have a tag that's separate from the 'Escalate' tag, that is available in the Contributor view filters. Maybe 'Needs Attention' is the correct tag to use in this case?

As for cases that are Escalated by contributors, in some cases it's been hard to determine at what point in the thread it was escalated and who escalated it. Any thoughts on this and should I file a separate bug?
Patrick.
>  We've done away with 1/1a, the tier2/Helpdesk SLA is to make sure everyone gets a response in 72 hours.
The HelpDesk SLA may have slipped to 72hr, and it may be unworkable for the HelpDesk to assist in hitting the desirable, initial, long standing and sometimes achieved objective of 100% replies within 24hrs. 

I do not see that means we should abandon that objective and not assist tier 1 in achieving that 24hr 100% target. That does not even need HelpDesk intervention. 
(A tier 1 reply after 12hrs could be that the thread is escalated. With suitable tagging and guidelines we could easily then hit 100% reply rate within 13>18 hours.)

> it's been hard to determine at what point in the thread it was escalated and who escalated it.
My personal opinion
File a bug for some future system to  do that well. 
A reasonable solution that could suffice may be something akin to the report abuse button, but publicly: flagged, viewable & actionable. (Maybe  restrict flag deletion to registered contributors, or moderators.)  

For now it should be relatively easy to deal with at least as a stopgap simply by modifying Forum Guidelines. 
Ask contributors to always mention within the thread when they escalate something. 
Do your Zendesk tickets not have a timestamp ? 

As a further enhancement and *I would say it is worth filing a bug for this*:
Put the escalating box in reply comment as already happens with the "needs info" tag Bug 950062. 
That prevents the situation where anyone without hardly thinking and without commenting may escalate any post.

Later I will comment further in thread 
>"[Attn Helpdesk] & Everyone. Escalation of unresolved threads"
> https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/forums/contributors/709846
I'll change the tag for escalating new questions without a reply in 24 hours to: auto-escalate-new
Assignee: nobody → rrosario
I would suggest to use the tag "Urgent" for auto-escalated threads. In this way we also make it obvious for everybody that those users have been waiting for more than 24 hours for an answer.
I like Urgent as well. Short and sweet.
(In reply to madalina from comment #7)
> I would suggest to use the tag "Urgent" for auto-escalated threads. In this
> way we also make it obvious for everybody that those users have been waiting
> for more than 24 hours for an answer.

(In reply to Patrick McClard;pmcclard from comment #8)
> I like Urgent as well. Short and sweet.



Urgent it is! Thanks!!
I don't care for the "Urgent" tag name.  Users who see forum threads tagged "Urgent" might try to add it to other threads that they think need urgent attention.

I would have preferred "auto-escalated" myself.
Good point Alice. My only concern is will the "auto-escalate" tag make sense to everybody who is contributing to answering questions? The idea is to point out that those questions have not received a reply in 24 hours and we need to act on them as soon as possible.

I'm fine with either tag as long as they make it easy for contributors to understand what the tag is about.
I understand the desire to mark those questions in a special way, but I'm worried that we are overloading the forum with too many calls to action. Those who wish to reply to new questions predominantly can already filter for that by clicking on "New".

With "urgent" tag added you'd add the 3rd call to action. First, things that "need attention", then "new" questions that don't have any response yet, and then "urgent" questions that have been waiting for more than 24 hours.
I was under the impression this bug is only for a name change. In use the procedure
* adds a tag
* creates a ZenDesk ticket

It does not do anything else does it ?
It is not going to have a special category / filter is it ?? 
The whole point is to leave the question where Tier 1 see it still.
If so it is not really making any particular call for action, other than 
* the tag name discreetly displaying.(I agree the name *urgent* is more likely to lead to misuse of the tag.)
* the ZenDesk ticket, and that is apparently necessary and only directed at HelpDesk
Now see Bug 964571 the mystery deepens.
(In reply to madalina from comment #11)
> My only concern is will the "auto-escalate" tag make sense
> to everybody who is contributing to answering questions? The idea is to
> point out that those questions have not received a reply in 24 hours and we
> need to act on them as soon as possible.

 (In reply to Kadir Topal [:atopal] from comment #12)
> I understand the desire to mark those questions in a special way, but I'm
> worried that we are overloading the forum with too many calls to action.
> Those who wish to reply to new questions predominantly can already filter
> for that by clicking on "New".

I agree with Kadir.  Besides, these threads are already getting "urgent attention" simply by being auto-escalated to the Helpdesk. 

Questions: 
* If contributors review unanswered, auto-escalated questions before the Helpdesk gets to them, do you want them to tag difficult questions with the "escalate" tag? 

* If yes, then should threads tagged "escalate" that have already been "auto-escalated" for no reply generate a new Helpdesk ticket? 

* Do we even need to show a tag for "auto-escalated" questions?  

Maybe these unanswered questions could be automatically referred to the Helpdesk with a tag or other marker that's only visible to admin, if we still want other contributors to work on them and escalate difficult questions.   If a contributor sees that the question is already "auto-escalated" (or whatever you want to call the tag) they might not add the "escalate" tag, thinking that the Helpdesk is already working on it.
Alice, I think you have a good point here. We could just as well create Zendesk tickets without tagging those questions. The fewer default tags there are, the less confusing the whole escalation system becomes.

Let's talk about that in todays platform meeting.
Deployed to prod now. Auto-escalated questions will no longer be tagged at all.
Status: NEW → RESOLVED
Closed: 10 years ago
Resolution: --- → FIXED
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