Deciding which ticket to work on next

Your administrator can configure the application to display the Needs Attention flag to the tickets that have updates. Without checking all tickets, you can decide your priority of work by checking the tickets that are marked with the Needs Attention flag. When you access Dashboard, or Ticket Console, you see the Needs Attention flag in all incidents and work order tickets that need your attention to work on priority basis.

Before you begin

To make this feature available to you, your administrator must set the showNeedsAttentionFlag configuration parameter value to true as described in Setting configuration parameters in BMC Helix ITSM.

To decide which ticket to work on next

Access Dashboard.
Locate the tickets with the Needs Attention flag displayed active and start working on those tickets on priority.
Important
The Needs Attention activity is displayed on the Activity or Dashboard feed only when a user flags or unflags a ticket manually by clicking the flag or unflag icon. The activity is not displayed on the Activity or Dashboard feed when a ticket is automatically flagged or unflagged.

You can also perform the following steps:

Access Ticket Console.
Click Needs Attention statistics count.
All the tickets where the Needs Attention flags are active, are filtered and displayed on your screen.
Start working on those tickets on priority basis.

When tickets are flagged for attention

Incident and work order tickets are flagged for your attention in the following ways:

Flagging a ticket automatically

A ticket gets automatically flagged, where the assignee is not the logged in user, in the following cases:

When an update is received through email or from BMC Digital Workplace.
When you assign a ticket to another user.
When other users update the status or status reason of tickets, which are assigned to you (Applicable Statuses: In progress, Assigned, Pending, and Resolved).
When the Service Level Agreement (SLA) of a ticket is breached.
When a user adds a note to a ticket.

Unflagging a ticket automatically

A ticket gets automatically unflagged, where the assignee is the logged in user, in the following cases:

When you update the status or status reason of a ticket.
When you add a work note to a ticket which is assigned to you.

Flagging/Unflagging a ticket manually

To flag or unflag a ticket manually, click the flag icon in the ticket header. You must mention the reason for flagging or unflagging a ticket in the activity note.

Needs attention flag.png

You can also flag tickets from the ticket console directly. From the Ticket Console, select multiple tickets and manually flag or unflag the tickets for other user's attention by using the Needs Attention icon.

Flagging tickets that are in Closed, Canceled, or Rejected state

For tickets that are in Closed, Canceled, or Rejected state, by default, the Needs Attention flag is disabled. You cannot manually flag a ticket that is in these states.

A ticket that is in Closed, Canceled, or Rejected state gets flagged, where the assignee is not the logged in user, in the following cases:

When an update is received through email.
When a user adds a note to a ticket.
When a user sends an email directly from the ticket in BMC Helix ITSM.

In these cases, the flag icon is enabled and you can manually unflag a ticket, if needed. Once you unflag the ticket, the flag icon is disabled.

Instructions for classic interfaces

View instructions for Mid Tier

The Watch List provides a separate area where you can place particular records that you want to monitor. You can use the Watch List to track an incident request record throughout its lifecycle, even if it is reassigned to a group that you do not belong to. After you add an incident request record to the Watch List, it stays there until you remove it. The following table describes how to add and remove records from the Watch List.

Action	Note
View the Watch List	From the Show list in the Navigation pane, click Watch List.
Return to the Incidents table	From the Show list in the Navigation pane, run one of the searches.
Add records	From the Incidents table, select the record to add. Click Add to Watch List. You can access the incident record from the Incidents table, even if you add the incident to the Watch List.
Remove records	From the Watch List table, select the record to remove. Click Remove From Watch List. The record is removed from the Watch List. It is not removed from the database.

When you are viewing the Watch List, the Company and Filter By fields at the top of the Incident Management console are disabled.