Automation#22 Track Ticket Duration at Specific Status

Automation#22 Track Ticket Duration at Specific Status



Hello Everyone!

Welcome back to the Community Learning Series! Today, we explore how Zylker Techfix, a gadget servicing firm, boosted productivity by tracking the time spent at a particular ticket status in Zoho Desk. 

Zylker Techfix customized Zoho Desk’s ticket statuses to align with their servicing process. Here’s their workflow: when a gadget was submitted for service, the ticket entered “Open” status. After an initial examination, it moved to “Service” status, mapped to the “Hold” type while repairs were underway. Once repairs were complete, the ticket progressed to “Billing” and then to “Closed” after payment and delivery. To improve operations, Zylker Techfix wanted to know how long tickets stayed in “Service” status, giving them insights into potential delays and resource use. With a custom function, they tracked this time in a custom field, then used it to generate reports that highlighted areas for process improvement.

With this custom function, you can gain a clear view of your support timeline, identify bottlenecks, and serve clients more efficiently. Let’s dive into how you can implement this custom function to refine your own operations and drive productivity forward.

Prerequisites
1. Create a Custom Field
To track ticket duration at a StatusName (call it In progress) mapped to the Status Type On Hold, 
     
      1.1 Go to Setup (S) >> Customization >> Layouts and Fields.
             Select Tickets under Layouts and the Department in which you would like to track the ticket duration. 
      1.2 Create a custom single line field in the Tickets layout of the respective department. 
            1.2.1 Click on the layout, add a single line field with a label StatusTime. 
                      You can label the field with your preferred name. 
      1.3 Note the API names for the the single line field to insert into the custom function.     
            To find the API name, Click on the Gear wheel icon of the single line field.
            Click on Edit Properties, you will find the API Name under the Edit Field. Refer to Create Custom Fields. 

2. Create a connection
      2.1 Go to Setup(S) and choose Connections under Developer Space.
      2.2 Click Create Connection.
      2.3 Select Zoho OAuth under Default Connection.
      2.4 Set the connection name as deskconnection.
      2.5 Under Scope, choose the below scope values:
             Desk.tickets.READ
             Desk.tickets.UPDATE
      2.6 Click Create and Connect.
      2.7 Click Connect and click Accept.
Connection is created successfully.

Create a Workflow Rule
1. Go to Setup, choose Workflows under Automation. 
2. Under Workflows, click Rules >> Create Rule.

In the Basic Information section,
3. Select Tickets from the drop-down menu under Module.
4. Enter a Rule Name and Description for the rule.
5. If you want to activate the rule right away, select the Active checkbox. Else, create the rule and activate it later.
6. Click Next.
 
In the Execute on section, follow these steps:
7. Select Field Update, Choose Status.  
8. Click Next.
 
9. Leave the Criteria section blank and click Next. (Add a criteria if you require it.) 
10. In the Actions section, click the + icon and select New next to Custom Functions.
11. Enter a Name and Description for the custom function.
12. Under Argument Mapping, give a desired Method Name. Map the arguments as below: 
      12.1 In the Argument Name field, type ticketId and from the Value drop-down list, select Ticket Id under the Tickets Section.                                         
13. In the script window, insert the Custom Function given below:
  1. ///----<<<< User Inputs >>>>----
  2. deskURL = "https://desk.zoho.com";
  3. //Replace with your custom domain
  4. //Replace your Custom Field API Name to Update Desired Type Status Duration Ex: Open 
  5. durationApiName = "cf_status_name";
  6. // ex: "cf_open_time"
  7. //Replace your Desired Status Type Name Ex: Open
  8. statusType = "On Hold";
  9. // Open or On Hold or Closed
  10. //Replace the Status Name 
  11. statusName = "In Progress";
  12. // Ex: In Progress, Waiting for Reply, etc
  13. // ----<<<< Initial Configs >>>>----
  14. logs = Map();
  15. logs.insert("ticketId":ticketId);
  16. openHoursToUpdate = 0;
  17. openMinutesToUpdate = 0;
  18. onHoldHoursToUpdate = 0;
  19. onHoldMinutesToUpdate = 0;
  20. //---------------------------
  21. try 
  22. {
  23. // ---- start your logic from here ----
  24. ticketStatusLifeCycleInfo = invokeurl
  25. [
  26.   url :deskURL + "/api/v1/tickets/" + ticketId + "/statusLifeCycle"
  27.   type :GET
  28.   connection:"deskconnection"
  29. ];
  30. logs.insert("ticketStatusLifeCycleInfo":ticketStatusLifeCycleInfo);
  31. if(ticketStatusLifeCycleInfo != null && ticketStatusLifeCycleInfo.containsKey("statusLifeCycle") && ticketStatusLifeCycleInfo.get("statusLifeCycle").size() > 0)
  32. {
  33.   for each  statusInfo in ticketStatusLifeCycleInfo.get("statusLifeCycle")
  34.   {
  35.   statusType = statusInfo.get("statusType");
  36.   statusName = statusInfo.get("status");
  37.   if(statusType == statusType && statusName == statusName)
  38.   {
  39.     statusDuration = statusInfo.get("duration");
  40.     if(statusDuration != null && statusDuration != "")
  41.     {
  42.     statusDuration = statusDuration.replaceAll(" hrs","");
  43.     durationCollection = statusDuration.toCollection(":");
  44.     hourDuration = durationCollection.get(0);
  45.     minuteDuration = durationCollection.get(1);
  46.     openHoursToUpdate = openHoursToUpdate + hourDuration.toNumber();
  47.     openMinutesToUpdate = openMinutesToUpdate + minuteDuration.toNumber();
  48.     }
  49.   }
  50.   }
  51.   openHoursToUpdate = (openMinutesToUpdate / 60).toNumber() + openHoursToUpdate;
  52.   openMinutesToUpdate = openMinutesToUpdate % 60;
  53.   logs.insert("openHoursToUpdate":openHoursToUpdate);
  54.   logs.insert("openMinutesToUpdate":openMinutesToUpdate);
  55.   ticketUpdateParams = Map();
  56.   ticketUpdateParams.insert("cf":{durationApiName:openHoursToUpdate + ":" + openMinutesToUpdate});
  57.   logs.insert("ticketUpdateParams":ticketUpdateParams);
  58.   ticketUpdate = invokeurl
  59.   [
  60.   url :deskURL + "/api/v1/tickets/" + ticketId
  61.   type :PUT
  62.   parameters:ticketUpdateParams + ""
  63.   connection:"deskconnection"
  64.   ];
  65.   logs.insert("ticketUpdate":ticketUpdate);
  66. }
  67. }
  68. catch (errorInfo)
  69. {
  70. logs.insert("errorInfo":errorInfo);
  71. }
  72. info "logs: \n" + logs; 
  73. logs.insert("errorInfo":errorInfo);
  74. info "logs: \n" + logs;
NOTE
a. In Line 2, Replace ".com" with the domain extension based on your Data Center.
b. In Line 5, add the API name of the custom field created within the Tickets layout. 
c. In Line 8 and line 11, enter the status type and status name. 
14. Click Save to save the custom function.
15. Click Save again to save the workflow.

Creating Ticket Tracking Reports
You can generate Reports under Analytics to view the time duration of your tickets in one go. 
Go to the Analytics module >> Choose Reports >> Add Report >> Select Tickets module and Time Entry under Related modules. Refer to Create Custom Report 

Let us know how this custom helps improve your ticketing process.

Until next week,
Warm regards,
Lydia | Zoho Desk 

    • Sticky Posts

    • Register for Zoho Desk Beta Community

      With the start of the year, we have decided to take a small step in making the life of our customers a little easier. We now have easy access to all our upcoming features and a faster way to request for beta access. We open betas for some of our features

    • Share your Zoho Desk story with us!

      Tell us how you use Zoho Desk for your business and inspire others with your story. Be it a simple workflow rule that helps you navigate complex processes or a macro that saves your team a lot of time; share it here and help the community learn and grow with shared knowledge. 

    • Tip #1: Learn to pick the right channels

      Mail, live chat, telephony, social media, web forms—there are so many support channels out there. Trying to pick the right channels to offer your customers can get pretty confusing. Emails are most useful when the customer wants to put things on record. However, escalated or complicated issues should not be resolved over email because it's slow and impersonal.  When you need immediate responses, live chat is more suitable. It's also quick and convenient, so it's the go-to channel for small issues. 

    • Welcome to Zoho Desk Community - Say hello here!

      Hello everyone! Though we have been here for a while, it’s time to formally establish the Zoho Desk Community; we’re really happy to have you all here! This can be the place where you take a moment to introduce yourself to the rest of the community. We’d love to hear all about you, what you do, what company or industry you work for, how you use Zoho Desk and anything else that you will like to share! Here’s a little about me. I am Chinmayee. I have been associated with Zoho since 2014. I joined here

    • Webinar 1: Blueprint for Customer Service

      With the launch of a host of new features in Zoho Desk, we thought it’ll be great to have a few webinars to help our customers make the most of them. We’re starting off with our most talked about feature, Blueprint in Zoho Desk. You can register for the Blueprint webinar here: The webinar will be delivered by our in-house product experts. This is a good opportunity to ask questions to our experts and understand how Blueprint can help you automate your service processes. We look forward to seeing

    • Recent Topics

    • Target for a campaign

      Hi, Hope you can help me. I need to create a report (for a marketing campaign) that combines Deals and Contacts to export all the contacts with closed deals. I can easily do that, what I cannot do is to remove from the target the contacts that have more

    • Zoho Desk + Jira integration - Email notifications and comments posted by administrator instead of real user

      Dear All, I set up the integration under my admin account, and now when users leave comments in Jira (to created tickets in Zoho Desk), the email notifications show that the ‘Administrator’ left a comment, not a real user. The same happens in the ticket

    • Celebrating the power of visuals

      On World Photography Day, we would like to highlight the power of visuals in customer service. Visuals promote learning and understanding in less time. A photograph can rekindle a memory, convey more than words, and give a fresh perspective. How does

    • Customer address in Zoho Bookings

      Hello,  Is it possible to add customer address information to the Zoho bookings appointment screen? Or have it pull that information automatically from the CRM? We are wanting to use this as a field management software but it is difficult to pull the address from multiple sources when it would be ideal to have a clickable address on the appointment screen that opens up the user's maps.  It would also be advantageous for the "list view" to show appointment times instead of just duration and booking

    • Blocking / black listing customers

      Hi, We have a situation, we observed that certain customers are blocking multiple appointments with our advsiors but not showing up. Some of these are repeat offenders. This leads to those service hours getting blocked and not available for genuine customers.

    • Option to block bookings from specific email address or ip adresss in zoho booking

      Sometime few of our client keep booking irrelevant booking service just to resolve their queries and they keep booking it again and again whenever they have queries. Currently its disturbing our current communication process and hierarchy which we have

    • Feature Request: Email Templates for notifications accross all services

      Currently in Zoho Bookings, email notifications (such as booking confirmations, reminders, and cancellations) must be customized individually for each service. This becomes time-consuming and error-prone when managing multiple services that require consistent

    • Allow customers to choose meeting venue and meeting duration on booking page

      My business primarily involves one-to-one meetings with my clients. Given the hybrid-work world we now find ourselves in, these meetings can take several forms (which I think of as the meeting "venue"): In-person Zoom Phone call I currently handle these

    • Approval-based booking with Zoho Creator and Zoho Bookings

      Hi community members, We have developed a workaround for approval-based booking using Zoho Creator and Zoho Bookings! This provides a temporary solution as we work on the native feature, and it's useful for anyone needing an approval workflow when confirming

    • Member Accounts in Related List

      Hi Team, Currently, when a parent account is associated with an account in FSM, there is no related list displaying the associated member accounts under the parent account’s related list section. To view member accounts, I have to manually search using

    • how do i remove a specific Zoho Service from my account

      I no longer need Zoho CRM, ZRM Assist nor ZRM BugTracker. How do I remove them from the list of apps for my account?

    • I Want migarte all invoice details to zoho sheets

      I want to migrate all existing invoice details to Zoho Sheet, and automatically update the sheet whenever a new invoice is created.

    • were can i find my invoices i need this for my accountant

      were can i find my invoices i need this for my accountant, how can i get id direct to my email?

    • ONLY email field not populating Writer fillable document (randomly)

      I have a Zoho Writer fillable document that has pulled all my data from my Zoho Sheets file, EXCEPT the email column. It pulled every data before and after that column with no issues. Screenshots attached. It's not my first time using the app or the feature,

    • My number is marked as spam

      Hello Zoho Mail Support, My phone number was incorrectly flagged as “spam” during sign-up. This is my personal number, and I have not engaged in any spam activities. Kindly review and verify my account so I can proceed with my email setup. Thanks.

    • Personnalisation des paramètres dans Zoho Mail

      Pourquoi cela compte-t-il ? La personnalisation des paramètres dans Zoho Mail permet aux administrateurs de configurer l’environnement de messagerie en fonction des besoins spécifiques de leur organisation. Que ce soit pour alléger l’interface pour certaines

    • How To Save Data Into Zoho CRM Sandbox

      Hi Community, I want to save data into my zoho sandbox , for this I am using this api endpoint - https://www.zohoapis.com/crm/v8/Patients but I am getting this error - { "success": false, "message": "Zoho API request failed", "error": { "code": "INVALID_MODULE",

    • Automate pushing Zoho CRM backups into Zoho WorkDrive

      Through our Zoho One subscription we have both Zoho CRM and Zoho WorkDrive. We have regular backups setup in Zoho CRM. Once the backup is created, we are notified. Since we want to keep these backups for more than 7 days, we manually download them. They

    • Question about retrieving unsubscribed contacts (outside of lists) via API

      Hello, I am currently using Zoho Marketing Automation and would like to integrate it with our company’s core system. For this purpose, I am exploring the API options available to retrieve contact information. Specifically, I would like to know if there

    • Getting “mandatory field missing: Service_Line_Items” When Creating Work Order via Zoho Flow Deluge

      Hi Team, I’m trying to create a Work Order in Zoho FSM with only a Service Line Item (no Parts). However, I keep getting this error: Work Order Response: {"code":"MANDATORY_NOT_FOUND","details":{"api_name":"Service_Line_Items"},"message":"required field

    • How to customize the colors of the Client Portal login screen and add the company logo?

      As title, how to customize the colors of the Client Portal login screen and add the company logo?

    • Daily updates/fixes and how to see what was changed?

      When I receive the notification that zoho was updated and I need to refresh it. How can I see what was changed or fixed? Sometimes they change things that effect my books and I need to know what they did. For example over this past weekend something was

    • Upcoming Change: Snowflake Username/Password Authentication Deprecation – Action Required

      Hello Users, Snowflake has officially announced that username and password-based authentication will be deprecated by November 2025. You can find the official announcement [here]. If you're using a Snowflake connection in Zoho Analytics to import data,

    • Why should I choose Zoho Inventory vs Odoo?

      Hello there! I have used Zoho in different companies I've worked in, and I have a positive perception of it. I am starting a new import business for pipes, tubes, fittings, valves, elbows, etc., which all have serial numbers, cast numbers, etc., so I

    • Product Updates in Zoho Workplace applications | July 2025

      Hello Workplace Community, Let’s take a look at the new features and enhancements that went live across all Workplace applications this July. Zoho Mail Import bookmarks from Pocket Worried about losing your Pocket bookmarks? Don't worry we have got you.

    • PLEASE FIX YOR BUGS

      PICTURES ARE BEING REJECTED DESPITE THEM FOLLOWING THE GUIDELINES ON DIMENTIONS.

    • Kaizen# 204 - Answering Your Questions | Perform Field Updates before Blueprint transition via Client Script

      Hello everyone! Welcome back to another exciting Kaizen post. One of the questions we received through your Kaizen feedback was: “How can I update fields before Blueprint transition and how to prevent a transition based on a condition using Client Script?”

    • Create online meetings for Booking Pages with Zoho Meetings and Zoom

      Greetings, We hope you're all doing well. We're excited to share some recent enhancements to Bigin's Booking Pages. As you know, Booking Pages let you create public pages to share your availability so that your customers can easily book time slots with

    • Filters in audit logs

      Greetings, I hope all of you are doing well. We're happy to announce a few recent enhancements we've made to Bigin. We'll go over each one in detail. Previously, there were no filters available to narrow down data in audit logs. Now, we've introduced

    • Enhanced help options in Bigin

      Greetings, We're excited to introduce a new enhancement to Bigin's Help section: a comprehensive Help Options panel that brings together all your support resources in a single, well-organized space. Previously, the Need Help? menu provided only a limited

    • Zoho FSM API Developer Needed

      Hi, I’m looking for a developer with experience using Zoho FSM APIs. Scope: Connect WordPress website booking form to Zoho FSM Check availability (date, time, region) Create Work Orders + Service Appointments automatically Notify both customer and scheduler

    • Revenue Management: #4 What if there are uncertainties in project or service delivery?

      Our previous post taught us how Zoho Billing makes life easy for businesses with its automated revenue recognition rule. However, certain businesses have more challenges that an automated system cannot handle, and there are certain situations where automated

    • This mobile number has been marked spam. Please contact support-as@zohocorp.com

      Bom dia, estou tentando colocar o número 11 94287-6695 e esta com erro "This mobile number has been marked spam. Please contact support-as@zohocorp.com" pode me ajudar, por favor?

    • Items Serial Tracking Issue

      We enabled Zoho Items inventory tracking then disabled it after some time now we want to enable it again When I check the missing serial number reports I see one item But I cant see any option to Add the serial numbers Where and how to add the serial

    • Composite Services and Account Tracking

      I am looking to garner support/request the ability to make composite services. A quick search in the forums brings up multiple requests for this feature. I fail to see why an item is mandatory while services are optional. I also would like to see the

    • Zoho Payroll integration with Zoho Books - unable to match multiple bank feeds to one wage payment

      For one employee's wage, I make two partial payments. Those bank feed transactions come into Zoho Books via bank integration. I make one pay-run for the month in Zoho Payroll and that comes into Zoho Books via the Zoho integration. Zoho Books doesn't let me match multiple bank feed transactions against a single wage item. Please fix urgently. I can't complete my books because of this.

    • Add Checkbox Selection & Bulk Actions to Delivery Challans Module

      Hi Zoho Team, I’ve noticed that in the Sales Orders module, there are checkboxes beside each entry that allow users to select multiple records for bulk actions such as print, email, or delete. However, in the Delivery Challans module, this option appears

    • Can't be able to check-in in laptop

      even after giving location access still i can't be able to check-in in laptop.

    • Compensation Cess on Coal ₹400 per tonne. ?????

      The compensation cess rate varies by the type of product. And the cess is calculated based on the value of the product without GST. Coal, for example, comes with a cess of ₹400 per tonne. That means that if you sell 2 tonnes of coal that have a value

    • 7 month over zoho book purchase but still not immpliments Golive

      7 month over zoho book purchase but still not immpliments Golive one problems zoho team short out then other problems come still very poor mangments and immliments team . struggling with the templates in ZOHO Books. Especially with the placement of some

    • Next Page