Our Operating Principles

1. Deliver Value > help customers solve their difficult problems.

2. Be Easy to work with > issues are rare & quickly resolved.

3. Keep Impeccable Commitments > A promise made is a promise kept.

 

Our Purpose

Hartigen Support provides product and technical support for all Hartigen customers.

 

We work to ensure that your effort is optimized in the utilization of Hartigen tools and services. 

 

We seek to provide an impeccable customer experience to all Hartigen Customers, using the three principles above to guide our approach.

 

When and how to contact Hartigen Customer Support

For general questions regarding Hartigen or PowerOptix®

• Can PowerOptix® do X ?

• How do I do Y with PowerOptix®?

or if

• you think you’ve encountered a bug in PowerOptix®

• something isn’t behaving right while using PowerOptix®

• you’d like to request an enhancement for PowerOptix®

 

please submit a Support request via the portal https://hartigen.freshdesk.com/. The portal is our primary and preferred method for initiating contact with Customer Support.

 

Via the portal, Customers may submit support requests, view and respond to existing cases, and access the online knowledgebase at any time (24x7, 365).

 

Though less efficient, alternative methods include:

• Email: support@hartigen.com

• phone: 888-373-5082

 

Initiating support or seeking assistance using an individual’s email account or phone number is strongly discouraged. Any support requests outside of the portal https://hartigen.freshdesk.com/,  support@hartigen.com or 888-373-5082 are far more likely to be lost. Hartigen actively coaches employees who receive requests directly to re-route customers to the designated support channels.

 

Hartigen Customer Support seeks to respond to requests promptly and prioritizes the responses based on reported priority. Additional information is available in the Priority section below.

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Activities not typically performed by Customer Support

The support portal is also our primary and preferred method for initiating contact with all non-Support service teams. 

 

These include:

• Customer Evolution Services (CES)

• Settlement as a Service

• Business Evolution Services (BES)

 

Though received via support, these requests are not handled directly by the Customer Support Team. Rather, the Support Team will route those requests to the appropriate teams.

 

• Customer Evolution Services (included in PowerOptix subscription or maintenance)

  • Software environment management & Preventative Maintenance:

    • Environment monitoring

    • Custom configuration evolution

    • OS patches

  • Upgrade Management:

    • Track environment / software versions

    • Coordinate and perform upgrade activities

  • Application/Job monitoring

    • Proactive Performance Monitoring and Reporting

    • System/job alert optimization

  • Coordination of business continuity and failover testing/activities

• Settlement as a Service (additional subscription fee)

  • PowerOptix® system administration

  • Configuration of jobs necessary to download data from ISO/RTOs

  • Execution of shadow settlement processes and validation of results

  • Weekly summary of disputes

  • ISO/RTO subject matter expertise to evaluate settlements / data

  • Contacting ISO/RTOs to clarify data discrepancies or interpret market rules

  • Review results of settlement analysis with customer

• Business Evolution Services (additional subscription fee)

  • Automating business processes through configuration

  • Maintain custom solutions (integration, reports, save validations, extensions)

  • Create new custom solutions

  • System or Process Training

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Support does not action out of internal/external chat apps (Slack, Teams, Zoom), via individual email addresses or direct phone numbers.

For questions about specific customer situations, we need a support ticket (from the customer) or an internal request ticket (from a Hartigen team member).

 

There are several reasons why Support cannot respond to customer-specific requests made through these means:

• We aim to meet the Service Level Agreement (SLA) each time we help a customer, and we only track SLA compliance via FreshDesk.

• FreshDesk has a ticket assignment system which is vital to our workflow. We have no system to assign tickets in these apps.

• When we are trying to solve a current customer problem, we frequently search resolved tickets in FreshDesk. Since content is not maintained outside of FreshDesk, we may lose valuable information if a customer’s problem and/or the solutions to it are discussed instead of a FreshDesk ticket.

• We want to keep all of our records of a customer’s support challenges and their solutions in a single place (FreshDesk).

 

Hartigen Support is not IT support

• We are not equipped to resolve Password, Slack, Network, etc. issues.

• If you require that type of assistance, please contact your IT Support Team.

 

Emergency support

Hartigen defines an Emergency “High Priority Incident” as one where PowerOptix® is inoperable, no workaround is possible, and the Customer is unable to utilize PowerOptix® to perform a required business function. 

 

In these cases, Hartigen will begin to diagnose and to correct as soon as reasonably possible and will diligently pursue until a resolution is implemented. 

 

The resolution will be delivered as a workaround or emergency release.

    

Emergency support is provided around the clock and will be reviewed and responded to promptly.

 

Emergencies should be reported via phone (888-373-5082) and followed up via the Hartigen Customer Help Center portal, noting the “Priority” as “Urgent”.

 

Similar events with a non-production environment will not be considered an emergency.

 

Communications

Hartigen will communicate customer notices related to cases, upcoming product releases, hotfixes, beta testing, maintenance windows, or critical incidents via the Portal.

 

Knowledge Base

Basic Application Guidance

Customers may ask questions related to Hartigen product(s) as part of daily administrative maintenance of your solutions. If questions are specific to implemented features and / or if you desire changes to implemented functionality, such requests may be raised to Hartigen Professional Services for implementation and/or design consulting. Asking questions of Hartigen Customer Support does not take the place of formal administrative training and certification.

 

Self Service Knowledge Base

All Hartigen Customers have access to the knowledge base and self-guided “how to” materials found at hartigen.freshdesk.com. These resources are intended to provide basic information and do not take the place of formal administrative training and certification.

 

Designated Contacts

Designated Contacts are power users which Customers identify as primary liaisons between your organization and Hartigen for interactions with Hartigen Support.

 

These users are often system administrators and/or experienced users serving as Customer business leads.

 

Customers may identify multiple Designated Contacts. Hartigen recommends customers identify a minimum of two Designated Contacts.

 

Benefits

Benefits of the Designated Contact role include building consistency in support incident reporting and providing standards to maximize efficiencies for both Customer and Hartigen teams.

 

Utilizing a Designated Contact allows the Hartigen Customer Support team to respond more quickly and thoroughly because the information necessary to triage and address the issue is more often included in the initial report. In addition, a Designated Contact’s solution knowledge will build up over time to better triage future incidents that are reported by Customer and its users.

 

Responsibilities

Designated Contacts shall be responsible for overseeing Customer support case activities, which include:

• Developing and deploying troubleshooting processes within your organization.Designated contacts commonly serve as the system administrators or business leads for the customer’s solutions.

• Designated Contacts are expected to have successfully completed administrator training related to the solution provided by Hartigen. Customers are encouraged to ensure that Designated Contacts maintain their knowledge of the software and their implemented solution.

• Resolve any user account administration incidents (i.e., password reset, lockout, etc.) for end users.

• Ensure relevant information is provided to the Hartigen Customer Support team for all incidents opened. See details in Support Procedures section.

• Whenever possible and prior to submitting a Support request, the Designated Contact will:

  • Review available information and software / system documentation.

  • Confirm the presence of the issue on the customer’s test system. If the error cannot be reproduced in the test system (using the latest version and service pack), the customer may be asked to upgrade or update their software to the most recent release.

  • Document the steps taken to reproduce the issue and provide trace or other error logs to Hartigen Customer Support.

 

Customers who have identified Designated Contacts shall continue routing inbound cases through those Designated Contacts. Cases submitted by non-Designated Contacts may be delayed while Hartigen Support confirms the request by contacting the Designated Contact.  Hartigen Customer Support will assist the Designated Contacts to troubleshoot and resolve issues.

 

Exceptions

Hartigen understands that some Customers using some Hartigen products may not have the infrastructure or expertise to create an internal support team; therefore, establishing a Designated Contact for liaising with Hartigen Support Cases may not be feasible. In these situations, cases may be submitted by licensed users. Depending on the request, Hartigen reserves the right to confirm legitimacy of the request by contacting the Customer’s Hartigen product administrator before triaging the case. Confirming the request in this way may result in delayed case resolution.

 

Partners

Hartigen has partnered with select companies to extend a variety of services and functions. In cases submitted by a partner organization on behalf of a customer, the partner assumes the role of the customer. Hartigen Customer Support will communicate directly with the partner when necessary. Accordingly, the partner will observe the same approaches outlined in this Support overview.

 

Priority

Hartigen Customer Support will work with customers to establish priority for case response and resolution based on a combination of customer-reported inputs. These inputs include but are not limited to the Priority of the issue, the affected environment(s), and the business impact. The table below provides additional context regarding Priority. Hartigen Customer Support will strive to react to prioritized cases within a designated time period as noted below.

 

When submitting a request for support, the customer will be asked to:

1. assign a priority rating to the issue.

2. provide information related to the business impact, and

3. identify the affected environment.

Taken together, these inputs help Hartigen Customer Support determine the approach for each case.

 

Any production environment outage should be reported as and will be treated as an Urgent/Critical issue.

 

If a customer submits multiple requests for support, each request will be prioritized. If the cases are assigned the same priority level, Hartigen Customer Support will address the issues in order of Priority (Urgent/Critical to Low).

 

 

 

Priority Scale

Urgent/ Critical (P1)

• Solution is non-operational or users cannot access the system, or the functionality is cripplingly decreased, or backup or other security of data can no longer be performed. 

• The defect affects mission-critical functions or information in the production environment and may include, but not be limited to, data loss or corruption, system crash or missing major functionality.

• This may include any defect related to safety, system availability, overall data integrity, or ability to serve the customer.

• Hartigen will work continuously with the customer to resolve the issue or to restore the solution.

• Priority 1 cases are reserved for production environments only.

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High (P2)

• Solution is operational with functional limitations or restrictions.

• The defect will have a large impact on the functionality of the application.

• This defect may allow for continued use of the application, but there may be compatibility or operability disruptions with no known work-around.

• These are business critical issues.

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Medium (P3)       

• Solution is operational with functional limitations or restrictions that are not critical to the overall system operation and the defect has a moderate impact on the functionality of the application.

• The application remains usable by all groups.

• A functional error exists for which there is an acceptable workaround.

 

Low (P4)       

• Solution is operational with problems or errors, which have little impact on the solution.

• P4 cases include minor or cosmetic issues, documentation errors, training, report requests, and change requests.

• Defect has minimal impact on production level environments.

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Hartigen understands that the priority of an issue may evolve over time. While reprioritization is not guaranteed, these situational changes may be discussed between the Designated Contact and the assigned Case Owner.

 

Incident Management

Upon confirmation of Priority, the Hartigen Customer Support team will review and provide initial triage of the Customer-reported incident based upon Customer-provided replication steps, business impact, effected environment, and reported Priority.

 

Hartigen will look for trends related to submitted cases and work to resolve the incident as quickly as possible. Should the incident not be able to be replicated or otherwise resolved, the Hartigen Customer Support team may escalate to engage other teams as appropriate to expedite the resolution of the incident or confirm to Customer that the incident could not be replicated.

 

Initial Response Time

Target initial response times for classified issues are provided for reference and may change without notice. Resolution times will vary based on the issue being addressed.

 

P1 issues (Urgent/Critical) are reserved for production environment issues, including production system outages, severe degradation of software performance, and/or other Urgent/Critical matters.

 

Issue Classification | Target Initial Response Time

• Urgent/Critical (P1) | <2 business hours

• High (P2)                  | <8 business hours

• Medium (P3)            | <2 business days

• Low (P4)                   | <3 business days

 

Standard Business Hours

Hartigen observes the following standard business hours, Monday through Friday, excluding holidays:

• North America: 7:00 am – 6:00 pm, CPT

 

Support agents are normally available during these standard business hours.  Notices of exceptions to this will be placed in the Hartigen Customer portal.

 

Hartigen also provides extended (emergency) on-call support hours for emergency issues from 6:00pm to 7:00am CPT from Monday through Friday as well as during weekends and holidays (24x7 emergency support).

 

Responses for non-emergency issues (see Emergency Support) will be referred to and processed during standard business hours. 

 

Support Procedures

Incident Resolution Process

Hartigen leverages a defined process, case classification criteria and an online tracking system to effectively facilitate each step. Customers who contact the Hartigen Customer Support team should expect the following: 

• A Customer submits a case and receives an auto response email with the case ID and link.

• The Customer may use the Hartigen Customer Support Portal to view the submitted case for progress, submit additional information, to review knowledge base articles, and to communicate with Hartigen Customer Support.

• The Hartigen Customer Support team monitors the support queue for new cases and determines the case priority and internal assignments.

• The Hartigen Customer Support Representative works with Customer and any other internal Hartigen teams until the case is resolved.

• When necessary, the case is escalated to other Hartigen teams to assist.

 

Before creating a case, the Customer will:

• Utilize their Designated Contact(s):

  • Collect and trouble-shoot issues prior to the Designated Contact contacting the Hartigen Customer Support team.

  • Routing through the Designated Contact prevents duplication of issues and may resolve simple problems more quickly.

  • It also allows for more efficient interaction between the customer and Hartigen Customer Support.

• Review Configuration and Setup:

  • Message logs

  • Job schedulers

  • Job histories

  • Log files

  • Application services

  • File locations

  • Directories, paths, and setup parameters

• Identify key dates, times and events:

  • When the problem began

  • Whether any changes have been made to the configuration or system

  • ISO/RTO changes (planned or unplanned)

• Review Documentation:

  • Release notes or “Read Me” files

  • Manuals and online help

• Review Online Solutions and Knowledgebase:

  • Use the Hartigen Customer Help Center portal to review existing cases and knowledgebase articles.

• Review and Verify Product Updates:

  • Verify the installation by ensuring that all appropriate product updates have been applied correctly and in the appropriate sequence.

  • Access the Hartigen Customer Help Center portal for the most current product update information.

 

Submitting a Case

Once the customer’s Designated Contact(s) confirm an issue, that Designated Contact should submit a case through the Hartigen Customer Support portal.

 

Providing complete, detailed information helps accelerate solutions or answers. Cases are most quickly resolved when readily replicated and presented in an organized manner.

 

When submitting a case through the Hartigen Customer Support portal, these data points are required:

• Requester - (the Designated Contact or Affected User)

• Ticket Category - (Investigate, Defect, Enhancement Request, etc…)

• Subject - A meaningful subject line that describes the incident

• Priority - Select the Priority classification (see Priority definitions above)

• Description – Please Include a full description of the incident or request, including:

  • The user login/ID that experienced the incident (if different from the user reporting the issue).

  • The date / time / time zone when incident was first experienced.

  • The date / time / time zone when Hartigen product(s) last worked as intended.

  • Steps to reproduce – please include screenshots, trace / log files, etc… as attachments.

  • Describe the Business impact, e.g.:

    • Which processes are impacted?

    • How many users are affected?

    • Which user roles are impacted?

    • What regions, locations or markets are impacted?

  • The Environment affected:

    • What environment (Production, Test, etc.)?

    • If Production, is the issue repeatable in the Test environment?

• Product - the Hartigen product / module affected by the incident.

 

Case Owner

Each case will be assigned a Hartigen Case Owner. 

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The Case Owner is responsible for communicating with the Customer, updating the status of the case in a timely manner, referring the case to other departments when necessary for resolution, and escalating the case when necessary. 

 

The Case Owner assignment may change throughout the life of the case based on the complexity or level of analysis required to resolve the issue. 

 

Hartigen will determine the cause of the error experienced by the customer.  These frequently are determined as: 

• Configuration error – The cause of the problem is related to the configuration of the customer’s current system.

• Software error – The cause of the request is an error that can be resolved by Hartigen. The solution will be made available, depending on the priority, either as a hotfix, in a future scheduled release or Service Pack.  Priority 1 issues may be candidates for a hotfix resolution.  Hotfix solutions are available only on the latest version and service pack.  Other issues (priorities 2 – 4) may be resolved through a scheduled software release or service pack.

• Environmental error – The cause of the error is due to an issue on the Customer’s network or environment and cannot be supported by Hartigen.

• External software error – The cause of the request is an error in a third-party software, which cannot be resolved by Hartigen. Hartigen does not provide support for third-party software.  If the problem is determined to be due to a third-party software provider or integration with a third-party, Hartigen Support will not be able to resolve the issue until the third-party software is removed or the conflict is resolved.

 

Case Escalation

In the event of an issue taking longer than expected for action and resolution, Hartigen Customer Support has adopted rules to elevate the visibility of the case and to see the issue resolved promptly. 

 

Hartigen Customer Support seeks to provide exemplary service and support and will make concerted efforts to resolve issues as quickly as possible. Resolution times cannot be guaranteed. 

 

Customers are free to escalate a ticket if any of these are true:

• Progress has stalled and needs more attention / immediate intervention

• Priority of the ticket has changed (e.g. Low -> High)

• Structure and focus is required to remedy the situation

 

Order of escalation:

• The assigned Support Analyst working the issue

• Brian Synnott:Manager of Customer Support

• Batch Batchelder: VP of Customer Experience

• David Potts: Founder & CEO

Typically, customers achieve the needed outcome within level 1&2 escalations.

 

Customer Feedback

Hartigen Software actively and regularly seeks feedback from customers regarding our products and services. When a case is closed, the customer associated with the case will receive an email inviting them to complete a brief online Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) survey. The survey provides the customer the opportunity to provide quantitative (Exceeded, Met, Not Met) and qualitative (open text to describe the reasons) feedback.

 

At any point, customers may also reach out to a Customer Support Manager, the Vice President of Customer Experience or the Founder/CEO regarding their experience.

 

Hartigen takes customer feedback very seriously and shares it with Product Development, Professional Services, and other departments to improve our solutions and services. On behalf of the organization, thank you for taking the time to provide your perspective regarding our efforts to help your business. 

 

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Hartigen reserves the right to update this Support Overview at any time.