Reports in Web Help Desk convert ticket, asset, and billing statistics into visual information that helps you make informed decisions about your help desk operations. Reports are a great way to provide a high-level view about performance and trends. Sometimes, specific data can't be found in reports. And in those cases, Advanced Ticket Search would be a better tool. Check out the video titled "Reporting & Using Advanced Search" for a discussion on that topic.
Now let's look at a sample report included with Web Help Desk called "Assets count by location, asset type and asset status." There are three types of reports. This report is an Asset Report. There's also ticket reports and billing reports, and a composite type of report that combines two reports together.
Each report displays data defined by a chart metric attribute. For example, the number of tickets, average open time, or number of assets, like in this report. This depends on the selected report type. The report data is broken down into different attributes, such as Asset type, and displayed in a bar chart, pie chart, or simple tabular view.
The processed data appears on three axises: Bar Category, Bar Stack Category and Repetition Category. Bar category defines categories in a single chart. For example, Orion Nodes, Software, and Desktop like the first chart. Bar Stack Category displays the relationship of individual items to the whole, with each item described in the chart legend. In the example report, we can see asset statuses like down, up and deployed. Repetition Category sorts the data into multiple charts, with each chart dedicated to one attribute value, such as location in this report. The first chart shows the location data for Austin, Texas.
You can filter reports using various report settings, as well as filters you select in the third tab of this view. Let's look at three examples of creating a report using existing reports as templates. Let's say your manager asks you to create a report for all laptops checked out by reservation during the last week.
First, we'll locate a report that displays the data we're looking for. "Assets checked out in a date range by Location" looks promising. When we run the report, we can see it almost provides the information we need, but it displays all assets without any specific time range.
Let's modify the report filters a little to create the report we need. First, we'll change the existing filter for assets checked out from two years to a one week timeframe.
Next, we'll add a new filter for Asset Type, change it to 'Inclusive', and choose 'Laptops.' Now let's run the report.
Here's the final report. We can export it to a PDF and send it to the manager.
For our next example, let's say your manager asks you how many tickets for each priority per location we closed last month. Again, we'll try to locate a report that displays the data we're looking for.
"Closed tickets this month" looks promising, so let's open it. This time, we only need to change Assigned Tech to 'Location', and change Time Range from ten years to one month. And here's the final report. We can export it to a PDF and send it to the manager.
For our last example, let's say your manager asks you to report the number of assets per location, type, and status that were purchased in the first quarter.
As we did before, we'll start with locating a report that displays the data we're looking for. "Asset count by Location, Manufacturer and Asset Status" seems to be the best choice. Let's select that report.
First, we'll change the Bar Category from Manufacturer to 'Asset Type.'
Next, we'll add a new filter for Purchase Date and define the dates as First January and 31st March of 2016. Now, let's run the report. Here's the report that we can export and send to our manager.