Recording time worked on an incident request

You must keep track of the time that you spend working on an incident request.

• If the incident request record is open on your desktop while you are working on it, you can use a timer to keep track of the time. Or, you can enter the time manually. See To record your time spent below.

• If you receive assistance from someone else, you can also keep track of their time through the Incident Assignment Log. This log contains a record of who created the current incident request as well as individual records for each group and person who was subsequently assigned to the request. Each record contains the total effort duration for each assignee (that is, the amount of time each group or person worked on the incident request) and other information. See To record an assistant's time below.
  When you create an incident, the Incident Assignment Log records the different assignment types automatically. Based on the value that you select from the Assignee list, the following records are created for different assignment types.

  Assignment type	Description
  Initiated	This record refers to the group or person who created the incident. This record is created in all cases.
  Assigned	This record refers to the previous assignments prior to the current assignment. This record is only created when you do not select a value from the Assignee list.

  Because the Incident Assignment Log is historical, it does not contain a record for the current assignee, only for previous assignees. The system updates the Incident Assignment Log with a record for the most recent assignee each time the incident request is reassigned. When the incident request is moved to the Closed state, the system writes the final assignee record to the Incident Assignment Log.

• You can also update the amount of time you spent working on an incident request after it has been assigned to another assignee. See To update your time after the incident request is reassigned below.

To record your time spent

1. Open the incident request record in Mid Tier.
2. In the Work Detail area, click the clock graphic beside the Assignee field to open the Effort Time Spent window.

3. Enter the time you spent on the incident request in the Effort Time Spent (Minutes) field.

   Tip

   Use the automatic timer to keep track of your time when you work on the incident request while the incident request record is open on your desktop. To start the timer, click the Stopped button. The text on the button changes to Started, and the button's text reports the timer's current status. When you finish working on the incident request, click the Started button. Then, the text on the button changes to Stopped.

4. Click Close.
   The Effort Time Spent (Minutes) field is a data entry field only. When you click Close, the time value that you provided in Effort Time Spent (Minutes) is written to a database field called Total Time Spent, which totals the time spent on the incident request for the current assignee. After Incident Management writes the time value to Total Time Spent, it resets Effort Time Spent (Minutes) to 0. If you reassign the incident request or resolve it, the cumulative time is written from Total Time Spent to the Assignment Log and Total Time Spent is reset to 0.
5. To save the time entry, click Save at the bottom of the incident form.

To update the Incident Assignment log

The Incident Assignment Log tracks support organizations and individuals who are assigned to work on an incident request. It also provides you with a way to track the amount of time spent on an incident request.

1. Open the incident request record in Mid Tier.
2. In the Work Detail area, click the clock graphic beside the Assignee field.
3. In the Effort Time Spent dialog box, click Update Assignment Log.

To record an assistant's time

Use this procedure to record time against an incident request for someone who assisted you but who was not formally assigned to the incident request.

1. Open the incident request record in Mid Tier.
2. In the Work Detail area, click the clock graphic beside the Assignee field to open the Effort Time Spent window.
3. Click Update Assignment Log to open the Incident Assignment Log dialog box.
4. Add the assistant to the Assignment Log by selecting values for the following fields:
   • Support Company — The name of the assistant's support company
   • Support Organization — The name of the assistant's support organization
   • Assigned Group — The name of the assistant's assigned group
   • Assignee — The name of the assistant's name of the individual
5. In the Effort Time Spent (Minutes) field, enter the time the assistant spent on the incident request.
6. Click Add.
   An entry containing this information appears in the table at the bottom of the Incident Assignment Log dialog box.

To update your time after the incident request is reassigned

Use this procedure to update the time that you spend on an incident request after it has been reassigned. For example, if the person or group to which the incident request is reassigned asks for your help with some aspect of the incident request resolution, you can update your record in the Incident Assignment Log with the additional time.

You can update the time only for your own Incident Assignment Log records. You cannot update the records of other support groups or individuals.

In the Incident Assignment Log, the system tracks the actual and business hours duration for which a ticket was in a given assignment queue.

1. Open the incident request record in Mid Tier.
2. In the Work Detail area, click the clock graphic beside the Assignee field to open the Effort Time Spent window.
3. Click Update Assignment Log.
4. In the table at the bottom of the Incident Assignment dialog box, select your record.
5. In the Effort Time Spent (Minutes) field of the Update Assignee Effort Duration area, type the number of minutes that you are adding or subtracting from your recorded time.

6. Click the plus button (+) or minus button (-) to add or subtract the time to the record's total amount of time.

   You cannot delete a completed assignment log.