Working with Cases

Working with Cases

In the world of Internet, online Customer Support has become an integral part of the organizations' business process. Customer Support is an important activity in all types of product and service industries. In general, case trouble tickets are used to capture customer feedback on various types of issues that arise after purchasing a product or service from your company. Sometimes customers provide good feature requests using this platform, that may be useful when developing future product or service enhancements.

Availability
Permission Required
Users with permission to View, Edit, and Delete the Cases Tab can access the Cases module.

Typical Case Management Process

  1. Customize the fields in the Case page according to your organization's Customer Support process (You may use the existing fields, disable some of the fields, or add new custom fields).
  2. Set up the case generation process by completing the Case form, importing the case data from external sources, or capturing cases directly from your Website using Web-to-Case form.
  3. Assign cases to the correct users using the workflow rules.
  4. Follow-up on cases until resolutions are sent to the customers.
  5. Once the resolution is working fine, add the solution to the publicly accessible Solutions module for future reference.

In Zoho CRM, cases can be generated through a phone call, email, or from the website. You can also generate cases from customer specific e-mails in Microsoft Outlook using the Zoho CRM Plug-in for MS Outlook.  See Also   Plug-in for Microsoft Outlook

Standard fields in the Cases module 

Following are the list of Zoho defined standard fields available in the Cases module:
Field Name
Description
Data type
Maximum Limit
Case Number
Display the case ID after creating a case.
Number
16 digit
Product Name
Select the product name related to the case.
Lookup
-
Case Owner
Select the name of the user to whom the case is assigned.
Lookup
-
Subject*
Specify the title of the Case. This field is mandatory.
Text box
Alphanumeric(255)
Priority
Select the priority of the Case from the drop-down list.
Pick list
-
Status*
Select the status of the Case from the drop-down list.
Pick list
-
Reported By
Displays the name of the contact.
-
-
Related To
Select the name of the contact who submitted the Case.
Lookup
-
Type
Select the type of problem. It can be a general question, feature request, or real issue in your product/service.
Pick list
-
Case Origin*
Select the source from which the case has been generated. You can select Email, Phone, or Website. If you select Email, you must specify the Email ID of the customer.
Pick list
-
Email
Specify the Email ID of the contact.
Email
Alphanumeric and Special characters
Account Name
Select the account related to the case
Lookup
 
Potential Name
Select the Potential related to the case
Lookup
 
Phone
Specify the phone number of the customer
Text box
Alphanumeric(50)
Case Reason
Specify the reason for the case
Pick list
-
Description
Specify complete details about the case.
Text Area
32000 characters
Internal Comments
Specify follow-up notes about case.
Text Area
3000 characters
Solution
Specify the solution provided
Text Area
32000 characters
Add Comment
specify the follow-up notes about the solution
Text Area
32000 characters

Creating Cases

In Zoho CRM, you can create cases by:
  • Entering data in the case details form:  You can manually fill in the Case details gathered from various external sources.
  • Importing cases from external source:  You can gather data through various sources and import the CSV and XLS files into Zoho CRM.
  • Capturing cases from website:  You can create web forms and allow website visitors to submit their case details or questions directly through forms. These details submitted in the website are captured directly into the Cases module. 
Notes
Note
Notes
  1. Some of the standard fields may not be visible or editable depending on your organization's business process.
  2. In case you want to add or modify fields, please contact your System Administrator for more details on the usage of other fields.

Creating Cases Individually

You can create cases individually by using the following:

  • Filling in the details in the case creation form.
  • Cloning the case with a few changes in the existing record.
Notes
Note
  1. By default, the person who creates the case owns it.
  2. To change owner, click the Change link in the Case Owner field from the Case Details page and select another user.
To create cases
  1. In the Cases module, click the Add (+) icon .
  2. In the Create Case page, enter the case details.
  3. Click Save.
To clone cases
  1. Click the Cases tab, click a particular case that you want to be cloned.
  2. In the Case Details page, click  Clone .
  3. In the Clone Case page, modify the required case details. 
  4. Click Save.

Emails in Cases

Users can send individual or mass emails to the related contact directly from the Cases module. Users can easily compose emails by clicking the Send Email button on a case record. The recipient's primary email address will automatically appear, and users can choose from secondary or custom addresses as well.


All case-specific emails sent to the associated contact directly from the Cases module in the Email section in the Related List can be viewed and can be filtered by Sent Emails from CRM or Emails associated with the contact. Mass emails can also be sent easily from the Cases module by selecting a pre-made template for the same query.

Associate Case with Other Records
You can create a 360-degree view of the Case to display all the associated details, such as potentials, cases, open activities, history of the completed activities, attachments, and notes.

In the Campaign Details page, you can associate the following records:
To associate cases with other records
  1. Open Activities:  To add tasks and events
  2. Closed Activities : To display all the closed tasks and events
  3. Attachments : To attach documents
  4. Notes : To add notes