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This article describes how to set up JIRA Enterprise as a helpdesk or support system. It is based on Atlassian's experiences using JIRA for support on https://support.atlassian.com, where we handle about 1300 support cases a month.

Getting Started

To try out a JIRA system preconfigured for helpdesk:

Please back up your existing JIRA Enterprise instance. You can read how to do this here.
Download JIRA 3.12.1+ Enterprise.
Download jira-helpdesk-sample.zip (containing the JIRA data)
Install JIRA and in the setup wizard, import the jira-helpdesk-sample.zip data.
Log in as user admin (password: sphere) and explore the system, with reference to this guide.

Features

JIRA configured as a helpdesk provides the following:

For Customers	For Support Staff	For Support Managers
A SSL-protected web interface supporting the creation and update of support cases. Email interface - customers can interact with the system entirely by email if they choose.	A relatively easy to use web interface for managing cases. For Firefox users, a set of support-specific extensions to optimize productivity. Email and (optionally) Jabber IM notifications of customer updates.	Charting and reporting capabilities, providing an overview of trends like support load, response and resolution times (see JIRA:below).

The extra configuration required to use JIRA as a helpdesk system includes:

Developing a support-specific JIRA workflow, with support for issue escalation and timeouts. See Atlassian Support workflow.
Automatic state transitions, ie. if a case isn't responded to for a week, it will automatically move to status "Inactive", and after another week, moves to "Closed". This is achieved with a Jelly script and Jelly runner service. See Automating issue timeouts.
Automatic state transition when an issue is commented on or updated by the customer. For instance, a customer adding a comment (eg. by email) for an issue in "Waiting for Customer" triggers a status change to "Atlassian Investigating". This is done via a custom JIRA listener. See Performing a workflow transition on comments and edits.
Alerts (by email or IM) of cases that have not been responded to in X hours. This is useful for staying within SLA-mandated response times. See SLAs and timeout alerts in JIRA.
Jabber IM notifications of events such as customer updates. See Jabber integration and SLAs and timeout alerts in JIRA.
Recording of customer timezone, to allow support staff to preferentially respond to people who are currently online. You will need to install this GreaseMonkey Script. (Firefox users only).

Overview

Customer's view of the system

Customers are directed to our support system, URL, https://support.atlassian.com. Before logging in, customers see:

After logging in, customers see a JIRA dashboard configured to show their past and current cases.

Creating a new support case

Clicking "Create New Issue" first prompts customers to select the product they want support for, and an issue type:

The next screen is where details of the issue are filled in. The fields to prompt for are completely configurable, and can be different for each project and issue type.

The newly created issue looks like this:

Support staff's view of the issue

Each support staff member then has their JIRA dashboard (front page) configured to display new issues, issues awaiting response, and anything else they find useful:

When searching for issues, supporters can see how long each issue has gone without a response.

Issues can be filtered by any field in the issue, date ranges, etc:

To the supporter, the issue the customer raised looks like this:

If the supporter wishes to 'take' the issue, they click "Assign to me & investigate" on the left, which sets the assignee and puts moves the issue from status "Open" to status "Investigating".

When the supporter is ready to respond, they click "Bounce to Customer", and add a comment:

After doing this, the status changes to "Waiting for Customer". The customer gets an email notification, and can view the update online:

Email integration

For every action taken on the issue, the customer gets an email notification. For instance, the "issue creation" notification looks like this:

If, for example, the customer wishes to respond to the last update by email rather than through the web interface, they can:

Their email response is then parsed and added as a comment on the issue:

The status is also automatically changed from "Waiting for Customer" to "Atlassian Investigating".

IM integration

If you have the IM listener installed, supporters will be messaged of updates if they are online:

Support Manager's view of the system

The JIRA Charting Plugin provides a number of useful portlets which managers can add to their JIRA dashboards. This sample dashboard shows statistics from support issue fields on the left, and graphs showing support load, response and resolution time on the right:

Requirements

What you will need to follow this tutorial:

A copy of JIRA Enterprise, which can be downloaded from Atlassian's website. JIRA Professional and Standard editions do not support role-based permissions used in this helpdesk configuration.
The JIRA Toolkit plugin, which provides many support-specific features for JIRA.
Optionally the JIRA Charting plugin.
A email account with POP or IMAP access. You probably also need to be able to set up server-side rules on the mail server to reroute or back up emails before processing.
If you want instant message integration (not required but useful), you need the JIRA Jabber Notifier Listener, and a Jabber server. A good choice for the Jabber server is Openfire from Jive software which is free/open source, but also has an Enterprise edition that comes with live chat integration.

Setting up JIRA as a helpdesk