Lesson 1 of 6
Lesson 1 — What a Help Desk Actually Does
Who calls the service desk, what tiers mean, and how a ticket travels from report to resolution.
Learn it
A help desk (service desk) is the single point of contact between staff or customers and the IT department.
Every request becomes a ticket: a written record with an ID, who reported it, what is broken, what was tried and how it ended.
Tier 1 handles common fixes (passwords, printers, software installs). Tier 2 handles deeper technical issues. Tier 3 is specialists and engineers.
Speed matters, but accuracy and a clear record matter more — the next person must be able to pick up where you left off.
Key terms
- Ticket
- The written record of a single reported issue or request.
- Incident
- An unplanned interruption or reduction in quality of a service.
- Service request
- A routine ask such as access, hardware or software.
- Escalation
- Passing a ticket to a higher tier or a manager.
- FCR
- First Contact Resolution — solved on the first interaction.
Follow one ticket
A teacher cannot log in 10 minutes before a lesson.
- 1Log: Capture name, device, location, exact error message and time it started.
- 2Classify: Incident, account category, high impact because a class is waiting.
- 3Diagnose: Check the account status — locked after five failed attempts.
- 4Resolve: Verify identity, unlock, confirm the teacher is in.
- 5Record: Write what happened and link it to the 'account lockout' knowledge article.
A good ticket note vs a bad one
textBAD: "Fixed it."
GOOD: 2026-08-25 09:14 - Reported by J. Rossi (Room B4, laptop LT-2291).
Symptom: 'Incorrect password' on Windows sign-in since 09:05.
Checked: AD account status = locked (5 failed attempts 09:02-09:05).
Action: identity verified via staff ID + line manager callback. Account unlocked.
Result: user signed in successfully at 09:16. Advised to update saved Wi-Fi password.
Category: Accounts > Lockout. KB-014 linked.A good note answers: what was reported, what you checked, what you did, and how you proved it worked.
Try it
Put the ticket lifecycle in the right order.
- 1Diagnose and attempt a fix
- 2User reports the issue
- 3Confirm with the user and close
- 4Escalate if out of scope
- 5Set priority from impact and urgency
- 6Log and categorise the ticket
Challenge
Write a ticket note for this call: 'The projector in Room A2 shows no signal from the teacher laptop. Started this morning. A class of 30 is waiting.' Include symptom, checks, action and result.
Pick whichever way suits you — every mode earns the same bonus XP.
Write at least 40 more characters to submit.
Mark your own work
Guided walkthrough — 0/3 clues revealed
- Clue 1 locked — reveal it only if you get stuck.
- Clue 2 locked — reveal it only if you get stuck.
- Clue 3 locked — reveal it only if you get stuck.
Each clue costs 3 XP (never below 15 XP). You'd earn 30 XP right now.