Service desk ticketing software

[Hades]

I am looking into service desk ticket software for small businesses. There are obviously the big hitters such as Service Now. But I want to look at tools for a much smaller company. If you have any experience with such tools I would be really interested to hear which tool you use, what you like or dislike about it and whether your company considered any alternatives.

Thank you.

 

[Throrik]

Do you just want ticketing, or do you want a more rounded ITSM tool as you mention Service Now which is obviously a behemoth.

I like Jira, but I know smaller places used to like things like Zendesk too. The current place uses a mix of Jira and Service Desk Plus. Plus some crazy home baked stuff that they're developing.

 

[d_brennen]

Have used both Zendesk and Freshdesk, both very good for SME. Using the latter at work now as it's broadly comparable and much cheaper than Zendesk.

 

[Hades]

Do you just want ticketing, or do you want a more rounded ITSM tool as you mention Service Now which is obviously a behemoth.

I like Jira, but I know smaller places used to like things like Zendesk too. The current place uses a mix of Jira and Service Desk Plus. Plus some crazy home baked stuff that they're developing.

At this stage just ticketing. Yes at my current company we use a combination of JIRA and SN. I like both. But my question is to explore ideas for a small startup. So for now it would be just ticketing and a lower cost than either SN or JIRA.

Thank you for the reply.

 

[Hades]

Have used both Zendesk and Freshdesk, both very good for SME. Using the latter at work now as it's broadly comparable and much cheaper than Zendesk.

Thanks. I am aware of Zendesk but Freshdesk is a new name to me. So I will take a look. Thank you.

 

[UberTiger]

I used the free version of freshdesk a few years ago and it was decent then. Not tried it recently.

Network chuck just did a vid on deploying your own self hosted open source ticketing desk, which was interesting, but I doubt they're comparable to the entry level features of the larger companies. Still, I might be wrong and they may be perfectly good for basic ticketing if that's all you need!

 

[Hades]

I used the free version of freshdesk a few years ago and it was decent then. Not tried it recently.

Network chuck just did a vid on deploying your own self hosted open source ticketing desk, which was interesting, but I doubt they're comparable to the entry level features of the larger companies. Still, I might be wrong and they may be perfectly good for basic ticketing if that's all you need!

Thanks. I'm definitely not averse to open source solutions. I have used a lot of other open source tools and while they sometimes lack the polish of commercial tools they can be really greate in some areas. I will have a watch.

 

[Trifid]

Consider going more ambitious and getting all internal functions under one system, HR, payroll, training, estates, facilities.

We use Hornbill at work, but I only really use a small part of its functionality to create a audit trail for change management. I like how it works for this.

 

[Throrik]

At this stage just ticketing. Yes at my current company we use a combination of JIRA and SN. I like both. But my question is to explore ideas for a small startup. So for now it would be just ticketing and a lower cost than either SN or JIRA.

Thank you for the reply.

How big is the startup? Jira is free for up to 10 people.

 

[Hades]

How big is the startup? Jira is free for up to 10 people.

Sub 10 people. Good point. Free JIRA could be an option. Thanks.

 

[Josh]

We use Freshdesk here for 2k+ end users, it's okay but not great - stay away from Jira though, we have a client who uses it and it's crap.

 

[dlockers]

I used Autodesk for a small 5 person team. It was overkill but worked well enough. I think they used it for accounts etc too.

 

[#Chri5#]

We used DeskPro at my previous job - worked well for a sub 10 person team

Deskpro | Helpdesk Software | Cloud or On-Premise

Deskpro: Your omnichannel helpdesk solution for efficient customer support, ticket management, and support collaboration.

www.deskpro.com

 

[Hades]

One again thanks for the suggestions.

 

[Andre]

You could try Spiceworks ticketing system https://www.spiceworks.com/free-help-desk-software/

 

[dowie]

Have used a mix of Jira, Seibel and in-house stuff and sometimes a combo of those.

I presume you mean a client-facing service desk? (since it's a small company)

You may want to consider that the software you find most useful in terms of client-facing stuff (which may or may not require development time) could be different to the software you find most useful for tracking/managing stuff within development/engineering.. some of which may come from the former in the case of features/bugs/requests for new features and some of which may be various tasks/changes related to planned new development.

 

[Vince]

Small company service desk its well worth looking at spiceworks. Its free and has a decent feature set. Edit: and has already been mentioned

 

[kindai]

Ive developed custom solutions based on PHP/MySQL for several customers previously, as it can be custom tailored it to their needs much more easily and they arent tied into any vendor or potential growth issues in the future.

It may be worth looking down that route, depending on the complexity of whats needed.

 

[Deleted member 77746]

I am looking into service desk ticket software for small businesses. There are obviously the big hitters such as Service Now. But I want to look at tools for a much smaller company. If you have any experience with such tools I would be really interested to hear which tool you use, what you like or dislike about it and whether your company considered any alternatives.

Thank you.

For a small business I would be tempted to check out open source OSTicket. We use it since it's a basic ticket system with a littl bit customisation. Runs on linux/Apache and also any webhost so you can stick it on a live domain if you fancy. You can also do emails > auto ticket generation.

Check it out.

 

[Hades]

Thank you.