Heralded across the industry for its commitment to its clients, customer service is the backbone of 3Squared. Within the business, the customer support department plays an integral role, enabling the company to work closely with the rail industry to drive innovation and support the move to a greener, digital railway.
As part of our ‘Meet the team’ series, we recently sat down with the customer support team, comprised of Claire Booth, Head of Client Support, and Support Analysts, Dan Pender, Joe Larkin, Scott McPhillie, and Will Jordan, to find out more about the key role they play within the business and more.
How does the customer support department support 3Squared?
We are the customers first point of contact for anything that they are having problems with or anything they would like to change. We provide second line services for most of our customers, where they triage any issues their users have, and then come to us when they cannot resolve these issues.
We also provide first line services for a large group of users for some of our clients, which includes data administration of their accounts and basic assistance and guidance.
We do regular reporting of internal and client statistics for both support tickets and the applications we support. Customers are encouraged to log tickets via our support portal or via email, however phone support is also available in an emergency or where electronic responses are not suitable.
We also provide a triage and resolution service for issues raised by the customer, whereby we either fix or replicate the issue and then manage these issues into the development process for resolution in a future software release.
What does the day-to-day of the team look like?
We have a blended working strategy, trying to have at least two days a week together in the office – the day often starts with two coffees for Claire and cereal for all!
From there, we manage a queue of tickets in the support system for all our clients, producing weekly, monthly, and quarterly reports. We have scheduled meetings with customers either through early life support where they are new to a product/module or to catch up and see how the tickets are going, and where they are in the resolution process.
We also work closely with all the other teams within the business to resolve customer issues and assist in scoping new features where the software is working as designed, albeit not how the customers want it to perform.
Throughout the day, we spend our time interrogating databases, for example checking error logs to see what might have caused any issues – this can involve a lot of head scratching! Everything is documented, to enable us to collectively learn so that we don’t have to ask the same questions twice.
What do you enjoy about working with the rail industry?
The rail industry is full of a lot of passionate people. It keeps us on the right track and chugging along!
We see the rail network and the industry in a different light and from a different perspective – you appreciate what goes into making the trains run on time and making the railways safe. It is much more interesting than finance or standard IT.
Overall, it feels good to be part of an industry that is helping to decarbonise the UK. Frankly, it is a greener industry than most.
What new initiatives has the team brought into the business?
We are proud to have introduced ‘Book Club’ – an agreed meeting to undertake a deep dive into something that we do or a piece of software we support. Before the session, we research the chosen topic and then discuss and go through uses to better understand how to support or use it.
We are also proud to have introduced several new features, including:
- Report Automation: Working towards scheduling reports to customers and scheduling tickets for the report reminders, therefore reducing the amount of manual collation and reminders.
- Release Notes page: Making the fixes that 3Squared have deployed more accessible to customers.
- Knowledge Base in the Support System: Providing the ability for customers to log tickets for different products that route to the right queues.
- Streamlining processes throughout the business.
- Improvement of SLA management and calculations in the support system and managing the Resolution plan agreement and dates.
What is your working relationship like within the team?
We work together collaboratively and individually and if there’s a big issue, we jump on a Teams call or into a room to work it out together. We enjoy what we do and working together, sharing banter and camaraderie within the team.
Everyone in the team is always willing to help and if you can’t get to the bottom of an issue, we work it out together, ensuring nobody is left abandoned. Claire helps with tickets if we can’t get to the bottom of them, which is useful as we are all relatively new to the business – to be learning together is quite simply, a great feeling.
We also thoroughly enjoy going to lunch together – QC’s Bagels and Bubble Tea are a must! Above all else, we are mates and colleagues, and we all work as a team, backing each other up.
What is your favourite thing about working at 3Squared?
There are many things we enjoy about working at 3Squared. From working with wonderful people, the company has a relaxed working environment – and lots of free food and coffee!
We work together, not against each other and have good relationships with our customers. The company has an open, honest, and collaborative culture and quite simply, it is a fantastic place to work.
We hope you have enjoyed this insight into the customer support department at 3Squared. If you would be interested in finding out more information about how you could join the 3Squared team, please get in touch with us here or by emailing [email protected]