Best Level of Effort is provided at the discretion of the service support professional to a customer for work related issues only. 

See CIT's General Service Expectations document section 4 which describes "Best Level of Effort." Keep in mind that any time spent assisting a customer with something we do not officially offer is time spent not assisting customers with services that we are expected to support for the university. 

Before providing ANY support the customer should know:  “This is not a CIT provided service, but if you still want assistance I can spend a few minutes helping”

• This response is intended for work-related IT questions only
• Standard amount of time for these is generally 10 to 20 minutes max *speak to your supervisor if you need guidance on the amount of time
• It’s OK to share external links from reputable sources
• If we support a competitor product, offer the supported product as a solution
• You should not provide support if you deem the request illegal / immoral (in which case it should be escalated to the manager). Read this KB Article for information on "Unsupported" scenarios which should not receive any support from CIT.  Tickets of this kind should be classified as "Unsupported" not "Best Level of Effort" 

Logging the ticket:

• Create a service request
• Categorize the ticket in TeamDynamix (TDX) as Service: Non-Service / Best Level of Effort
• Document your trouble-shooting steps in the ticket notes
• Document resolutions and any information that you suggested to the customer during the interaction

It is important for CIT to obtain as much information as possible for reporting purposes, as the support you are providing may inform CIT of something customers are interested in having us offer and officially support in the future. 

Tickets recorded as "Best Level of Effort" and "Unsupported" are reviewed Quarterly by the Service Management Team, and Customer Experience Director. 
 

Best Practices:

• Any template used for these types of tickets should have a line at the top of the communication that states: "Because CIT does not support this service and we are offering solutions, we suggest you back up your computer prior to attempting to follow any instruction provided from our team." 
• If a ticket has already been worked by a tech and the ticket is updated by the user and/or reopened the next tech to work the ticket should check with the original tech prior to jumping in on the ticket. This is to prevent confusion with the customer and possibly getting two different solution offerings.
• For services that are unsupported please refer to the KBA found here. 

Examples of scenarios in which providing "Best Level of Effort" support is appropriate: 

• Transferring a customer to another Cornell department such as HR, Registrars Office
• Directing people to resources for information such as Daily Check or their local IT group 
• Sending customers a url to login to "Workday"