You are here: Chapter 7: Configuration and Administration > Workspace Administration > Automated Workflow > Setting up an Escalation Rule

Setting up an Escalation Rule

This section covers the following steps to create an escalation:

  1. When to Run—Specify when the escalation should run.
  2. Issue Criteria—Select Issue criteria used to escalate Issues.
  3. Contact Criteria—Select Contact criteria used to escalate Issues.
  4. Advanced Criteria—Specify the types of Issues to be checked for escalation as well as other advanced criteria and also whether Advanced Actions, such as Change Manager activity, is included in the escalation.
  5. Actions—Select one or more actions to occur when an Issue meets the escalation criteria.
  6. Name/Save—Name and save the escalation information.

Note

Master Issues cannot be closed by an escalation rule.

Tab 1: When to Run

There are two kinds of escalation rules: instant and time-based.  Instant escalation rules are run at the time an Issue is created, edited, or both.  Time-based escalations are only applied after an Issue has remained open or unedited for a specified amount of time. Depending on which option is chosen, a number of sub-options are available.

Example:

In the above case, the Issue will be escalated at 12pm on Monday (6 working hours later).

Note

Escalated Issues lose their urgent status once they are edited.  If an Issue is reported as escalated, it is not escalated again until it has lost its urgency (by being edited) and then becomes urgent again. The exception to this is if Re-escalate Issue is selected under the Time criteria.

Select when to check an Issue against escalation criteria. There are two options:

To set Follow the Sun criteria:

  1. Select Follow the Sun.
  2. Select the time range for the escalation rule.
  3. If this escalation should run during a span of time that includes a change of date, you must specify the time spanned during both dates in order to cover the entire period.  For example, the four hours between 8:00pm and 2:00am can be covered by selecting 8:00pm-11:59pm above and, additionally, Midnight-2:00am in the second set of time criteria.
  4. Check the boxes corresponding to the days of the week that the escalation is required to run.

Tabs 2 and 3: Issue and Contact Criteria

The criteria chosen here determine which Issues are automatically escalated.  Available criteria include virtually all options that appear on the Advanced Search page, including Status, Priority, Assignee, Workspace fields, Address Book fields, etc. (see the section on Advanced Search for more information).

NOTE

If your rule requires that Create/edit must be by an agent, but a Customer Request status (such as Request) is used as a criterion for escalating an Issue, then it becomes possible for Customer Requests to be escalated (i.e., an escalation created by a Customer).

Tab 4: Advanced Criteria

In the Advanced Criteria tab, enter other criteria. These criteria are not matched to data in fields, but instead provide a filter for the Issues that are returned.

  1. Issue Types to Include—Specify whether Advanced Issue types, including Subtasks and Global Issues, are returned. Options include:
  2. All Issue Types—All Issue types are returned.
  3. Regular Issues—Regular (non-Global or Master/Subtask) Issues are returned.     
  4. Include Master IssuesMaster IssuesClosed that contain subtasks are returned.
  5. Include Subtasks—Subtasks of Master Issues are returned.            
  6. Include Global IssuesGlobal IssuesClosed are returned.
  7. Include GlobalLinks—All users' Issues linked to a Global Issue are returned.
  8. Group Master Issues with Subtasks/Global Issues with GlobalLinks—Available for Reports only. These options override the sort order selected in the report.
  9. Date—If dates are specified, the search returns only Issues from the time period specified. For more information, refer to Date Field Search Options.
  10. Age—Returns Issues created in the time specified.  Number of days and hours can be specified.  Modifiers are also provided, including “Greater Than”, “Less Than”, “Equal to”, “Greater than or Equal to”, “Less than or Equal to”, and “Not Equal to”.  As an example, to return Issues greater than 1 day old, choose “Greater than” and fill in “1” for “Days”.

Note

Age is always 24/7 and does not use the Workspace Work Schedule.

Note

Date/time fields can only be searched by date, not time.

Tab 5: Actions

  1. Notification
  2. Email—One or more email actions can be selected.
  3. Send a summary mail—When the escalation routine is run and matches are found, an email is sent to the specified addresses.  The email contains a summary of escalated Issues for the Workspace.  If you enter multiple email addresses, separate the addresses with a space.  Summary mails are not coded to use uploaded custom formatted files.  To use an uploaded mail template, edit the escalation to modify Email Notification from "Send a summary mail to ...." to "Send Single Issue notification mail to ..."
  4. Send mail to Assignees—When an Issues is escalated, an email is sent to all Assignees of each escalated Issue.  Select the email address type to use for this escalation rule:

Note

The different email address types are defined for each user on the Edit Agent Administration page, or on the My Preferences page by the Agent.

  1. Broadcast Message—One or more broadcast message types can be selected.
  2. Display pop-up notification to the following users—Specify a user or users to receive a broadcast message from FootPrints.
  3. Display pop-up notification to the Assignees—Agents assigned to the escalated Issues receive a broadcast message from FootPrints.
  1. Workflow—One or more workflow actions can be selected.
  1. Priority—Automatically raises or lowers the Issue’s priority as specified.  You can also change the priority of all escalated Issues to a specific priority.
  2. Status—Automatically change the status of the escalated Issue.
  3. Advanced Action—Execute the pending Advanced Action for the asset associated with the issue. This only applies if you have the BMC FootPrints Asset Core.
  4. Workspace/Address Book Fields—Automatically change specified Workspace/Address Book fields.  If you check this box, you must click the Click here to configure field edits link to specify the changes.
  5. Click here to configure field edits—This page allows you to update Workspace and Address Book fields via an escalation. In addition to editing other fields, you can change the Title field or append a description to the Description field.  Fill in the fields with the appropriate data and then click the "GO" button.

Note

If you notice that dependent fields are being displayed with a null value when an escalated Issue is edited, it may be that the dependent field was configured with an incorrect value in the escalation rule.  If you configure a dependent field to be changed to an invalid choice as a result of an escalation, the dependent field is populated with null data.  For example, if the first field were set to Software and the dependent field were changed to Printer when escalated, and Printer is not a valid choice for the Software dependent drop-down, when the Issue is edited, the dependent field will show no selection.  The drop-down for the dependent field will contain the normal, valid choices, so it can be corrected at that time.  To correct the problem at its source, edit the escalation rule and replace the incorrect choice with the correct choice.

  1. Assignment—Highlighted users are assigned to the escalated Issue.  If Add Selected Users is chosen, the original assignees of the Issue remain assigned.  If  Re-Assign is chosen, the original assignees are unassigned.  Teams and/or individual users can be selected.  Re-assignment can also automatically be made to Team Leaders or Assignees' Supervisor(s) by checking the appropriate box.
  2. Add to CC list—Click the Append This List to CCs of the Issue checkbox to include a list of email addresses to receive a notification as a CC to the issue. Click in the text field to add the CC list. When you click in the text field, a CC list editor pop-up window is displayed:
  3. CC addresses—The addresses you select are displayed in this field. Additionally, you can type email addresses directly into this field. Addresses must be space-separated. Select addresses
  4. Select FootPrints users—Click the user or users to be added to the CC list. If you select the Flat radio button, you can use the CTRL key to click on multiple users at one time. Once you have made your selections, click the add selected users icon to add them to the list. Alternatively, double-click the user names to add them to the list.
  5. Select a Contact from the Address Book—When you click the Select a Contact from the Address Book icon, the address book search engine is opened in a new window. Enter search criteria and click the GO button. When the search is completed, click the result to add it to the CC list, close the window without adding the user, or start a new address book search.

When you have finished creating your list, click the GO button.

  1. Add to one time CC list—Check the box to add email addresses. The addresses will be copied on the escalation notification the first time a notification is sent, but not on subsequent notifications. Click in the field below the checkbox to open the CC list editor pop-up window. See the instructions in step 2.f. (above) for details on using the editor.
  2. Sub-tasks for this Issue—Automatically creates sub-tasks for the Issue using the Master Quick Issue template that you select from the drop-down list.
  3. Copy Selected Fields of Escalated Subtasks to Master—When enabled, administrators can select subtask fields to be copied to the associated master task when this escalation runs on subtasks. Copies are made even if escalations do not change the subtask. Master task fields that are changed by this copy are identified in the master task history. Master task fields that already contain the desired values are not changed. If all selected fields match each other then no copies are made and no entry is logged in the history of the master task. This configuration is ignored by Issues that are not subtasks.

When enabled, a field picker is displayed. Select the fields that are to be copied to the master issue from the subtask by highlighting the field in the Available Workspace Fields list and then clicking the Add Field button. Remove a field that was previously selected by highlighting it in the Field to Copy list and then clicking the Remove Field button (this only removes the field from the list, not from the issue form).

Note

Sub-tasks are not created for an escalated Issue if the Issue is itself a sub-task, a GlobalLink, a Global Issue, or a Solution.

  1. Cross-workspace—The Issue is automatically copied or moved to the Workspace specified. If Copy with a Dynamic Link is selected, the Issues update each other when field data changes.  If Include Related Subtasks is checked, then when a Master Issue is copied or moved across Workspaces, the related subtasks are also copied or moved.

NOTE

Subtasks are not accepted by the receiving Workspace unless the receiving Workspace is configured for Cross-workspace copy/move of subtasks.  Refer to the topic for Issue Workflow for more information on setting this option.

  1. Color—The Issue is displayed on the FootPrints Homepage with the specified color.
  2. External Action—An external application can be run by the rule.  This feature is especially useful for running scripts.  For VBS scripts, some changes must be made to the registry (instructions for VBS script are below). The application must be one that can run and stop on its own without any user intervention.  In addition, if the program involves running a graphical user interface (GUI), it may not be able to display the interface to a screen, which could cause the application to hang and fail.  Therefore, the application should also be one that can run from a command line rather than a GUI.  Enter the full path to the program, e.g., D:\Programs\AppLite\applite.exe. Some field data from the escalated Issue can also be passed to the program as arguments:
  3. Issue Number—%%MRID%%
  4. Title—%%Title%%
  5. Priority—%%Priority%%
  6. Status—%%Status%%
  7. Submitter—%%SUBMITTER%%
  8. Workspace ID—%%PROJID%%
  9. Workspace and Address Book fields—%%FIELD NAME%% where "FIELD NAME" is the name of the field in upper case.

External actions run applications from the CGI directory.  Make sure that directory has permission to run the application or the external action will fail.

  1. Surveys—If checked, a customer satisfaction survey is sent to the contact when the escalation occurs.

Unassigning One Agent While Keeping the Rest Assigned

The administrator may need to build an escalation in which one agent, who is always the same agent, is removed from the assignments list while others, who vary from Issue to Issue, remain assigned to the Issue.  In this instance, it would not be possible to use the standard escalations page to unassign everyone and then re-assign the Issue because the agents who are to remain would vary from Issue to Issue.  An example where this might be needed is in the case of an Issue requiring an approval.  The approver might be the same agent every time, but the other assignees could vary.  This re-assignment can be accomplished via an escalation, but not by using the Assignment section of Step 4: Escalation Actions.  Instead, you would use the External Action function to run a command from the FootPrints API.  To do so, specify the following as an external action:

c:\FootprintsServiceCore\bin\perl\bin\perl c:\FootprintsServiceCore\bin\mrUnassign.pl %%MRID%% userID

Tab 6: Name/Save

After criteria and actions are chosen, you can name the escalation, decide whether to turn it on or off, and then save it

Enter your password and click Save; the escalation rule is enabled.  When an Issue matches the criteria of the rule, the specified actions occur.  If an escalation rule fails for any reason, the Workspace Administrator receives an email notification.

 

Scheduler Service

Escalations are run by the FootPrints Scheduler service. On Windows, FPSchedule.exe is automatically set as a service on the FootPrints server.  On UNIX, a cron job is automatically created that runs the MRrunScheduledScripts.pl file. This service handles incoming email, outgoing email notification, escalations, mass emails, and scheduled reports.

VBS Scripts

The VBS scripts interpreter (wscript.exe or cscript.exe) requires the presence of certain registry entries for IUSR_Machine user. Since an HKEY_CURRENT_USER hive is not available for the IUSR_Machine, IIS loads the HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT hive in its place. However, the HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT hive does not contain the necessary keys and entries for the scripting engine, and read access for IUSR_Machine user is not granted to the HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT hive. Therefore, in order to run VBS scripts as an external action from an escalation, the registry must be changed as follows:

  1. Using the Registry Editor, create the following Keys and Entries:

HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Windows Scripting Host

HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Windows Scripting Host\Settings

  1. Verify that the user IUSR_Machine has Read access to these keys(using regedt32).
  1. Create the following entries under HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Windows Scripting Host\Settings:

DisplayLogo: REG_DWORD: 0

Timeout: REG_DWORD: b4

BatchMode: REG_DWORD: 0