As the saying goes, prevention is always better than cure. When it comes to keeping the business running, especially for services that need to be functioning 24/7, it is imperative to ensure that transactions run smoothly. While it is uncommon for a Netsuite support issue to happen, checks and balances can be established within your teams so that you can address the problem immediately and prevent the need for further escalation.
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Aside from implementing a fail-safe plan that can address unexpected problems, your team can also proactively increase awareness about these issues. Knowing the likely problems that your team can face will also help you assess what type of fail-safe plan to implement and which best practices to observe. A proactive approach to key issues will also help your team identify which parts of the business process need to be realigned or augmented based on what’s happening in real time.
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Here are some of the common issues your team might face and some tips on how you can work around them. 
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Slow Progress on Cases/Tickets

Waiting for a response to the most urgent issues can be frustrating. Sometimes, the more complicated an issue is, the more time the corresponding support agent may need to address it. Also, the support team might be saturated with issues at the moment which can contribute to delays. Here are some tips you can try to mitigate the need to file tickets and ensure that only the most technical issues get elevated to Netsuite support. 
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Create an Internal Knowledge Base

It is good practice to document processes and craft SOPs, where applicable, for your team. This way, you can allow team members to self-serve various issues they may face. There are several productivity apps that you can consider that your team can use collaboratively to populate a knowledge base over time. You can also utilize this knowledge base to create your internal process of prioritizing issues. These issue levels can correspond to the service levels offered by Netsuite. 
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If you have a team that caters to your clients, create a process for pooling customer complaints and queries. Categorize them accordingly and try to chart how often each customer input occurs so that over time you can study how often different issues occur. From this pool, you can create FAQs or any other knowledge base that can be circulated internally.
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Provide Training and Re-training to Team Members

Team members may need to be constantly trained and re-trained to ensure they can adapt to the latest tools used to fulfill their roles. You don’t have to wait for issues to arise before you can offer this. Training can be part of your company's benefits and could help attract skilled applicants. It can also be a strategy used to incentivize good work performance. 

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Consultancy Mismatch

What can be more frustrating than waiting for a support reply is ending up transferred to another consultant. That, or the issue is not completely resolved. These things do happen because some consultants handle issues on a first-come, first-served basis and the top priority is to assure the client that someone is already looking into their issue. 
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Adopting a proactive approach to consultancy can be beneficial for you and your service provider. Proper planning and forecasting can serve as preventive measures to help you maximize your investment. Before signing up for a Netsuite plan, you may consider the following first.

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Get the Right Package for Your Business

Sometimes, consultancy mismatch happens because the services availed do not fit actual business needs. Have a needs assessment strategy before looking at options so that you can match with the type of support your business needs at the moment. In theory, it is good to consider support services that include bug fixes, customization, administration support, as well as report and business processing consultations. 

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Establish Communication Protocols

Before starting the engagement, you can set up Netsuite support protocols to properly label issues and identify their urgency. These items should be communicated before signing agreements so that both parties can agree to the services covered and expectations be set accordingly. The agreed protocols must then be a part of your team’s training and onboarding process to ensure that information is properly cascaded to all involved parties. 
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Have regular systems reviews so you can assess if the current package still supports your team’s needs. This way, you can implement internal checks and balances to see which problems can still be addressed and which might signal a need to upgrade the services you have availed. Doing a systems review allows you to provide better feedback to your service provider as you elaborate about areas that require improvement. It would also help your service provider address gaps that emerged and allocate them with proper resources. 

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Time Limitations on Accessing Support

Your allocated hours can only be used in each quarter and it might be challenging to manage this as work peaks differently throughout the year. Using the right strategies, you can maximize your allocated hours using the following methods.

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Categorize Customer Issues

Have you tried using a project management software? Notice how they often include a feature wherein an issue is categorized according to priority? You don’t need to create elaborate software to mimic the same dynamics of ticket issuance, but at the very least you can organize and define tickets alongside their priority. You might want to look into AI tools that can also help you streamline a process for organizing internal tickets and dispensing them to team members who may be able to address the issue before elevating them to Netsuite.

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Customize Your Netsuite Experience

Netsuite can be optimized according to your business needs. Look into ways how to better streamline team operations and increase productivity using your own workflow. Sometimes, issues happen because you have not yet unlocked the full potential of your tools. Speaking of workflows, create workflows that correspond to each of your team’s needs. Add custom forms and fields to enhance your business data or increase data security depending on user roles. Integrate third-party apps and tools to further enhance your workflows. These are just some of Netsuite’s customization features that are worthwhile to explore.
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Want to know which features to maximize and which business strategies can be empowered through Netsuite customization? Book a call with us and talk to our team of Netsuite experts. 

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