The symptom
Support resolves requests and tracks response times. Recurring difficulties still show up faintly in the decisions made about the service.
The signal
Support requests can reveal problems worth examining. They complete research and other feedback, without representing everyone who uses the service.
What’s going on
A support request already contains effort somebody made to get help. The first responsibility is to answer that need. Turning the contact into a source of learning must not delay handling it, or treat the person as a research participant recruited without their knowledge. The exchanges may arrive in a ticketing tool, on the phone, at a counter, or on a messaging channel set up for it. Support holds knowledge of the context that deserves to travel with the extracts it passes on. Reading the messages without that explanation can lead you to misread them.
Several people ask where to download an invoice. The button may be hard to find, but other causes are possible: a missing access right, an invoice that was never produced, a term that was misunderstood. Grouping the requests is not enough to establish the cause.
The most frequent reason is not always the most important. Look also at severity, at who is affected, and at the difficulties of the people who never contact support at all. A product fix, a procedure, or clearer help can each be useful depending on the case.
This work costs reading and analysis time. Book a slot with the support team, and use only the information that is necessary and authorised. To start, a few cases prepared with them may be enough.
Check this
With support, choose a small set of requests you can reach. Note the problem described, one possible cause, and what would let you check it. Do not mistake the label for the diagnosis.
Propose a proportionate response with the people who can decide. At the next check-in, look at whether the difficulty is better resolved and whether it comes back, accounting for the volume of use. Fewer contacts does not on its own prove things are better.
From where you sit
- Support: bring the context of the cases, and protect the time for handling them.
- Product: compare frequency, severity, and the uses absent from the requests received.
- Design: check an assumption about understanding before moving a button.
- Management: set aside time to analyse and to follow up on the observations.
To discuss
Which recurring reason deserves a check, and what information are we missing to choose the response?