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Restructure the "on behalf of" form on the Support Super Form

Problem Statement

What is the problem?

Many tickets submitted from the Support Super Form using the Create a support ticket on behalf of a prospect or customer option should instead be submitted either directly by the customer or by using the Internal Request form.

Why is this a problem?

  1. The Internal Request form is structured to display clearly the type of internal request and to gather and deliver specific information based on the type. All of that clarity is lost by using the "on behalf of" form instead of the Internal Request form, which increases the LOE for Support and the TTR for the customer.
  2. Some of the information that must be shared and discussed in working an internal request should not be shared with the customer. But in the "on behalf of" ticket type, all of that information will in fact be shared with the customer unless the participants use internal comments instead of public ones. This creates an unnecessary risk.
  3. Tickets that do not fit into the Internal Request space should in general be submitted by the customer, not by GitLab team members. Why is it better for the customer to submit the ticket than to have a GitLab team member submit "on behalf of" the customer?
    1. Almost always the customer will provide more detail and a more accurate and thorough problem description
    2. When the customer submits a ticket, Support is able to move the ticket around to the appropriate form and team (L&R, Dedicated, Self-managed, ...)
    3. The "on behalf of" form doesn't request or gather as much information as the customer-facing forms do, so time is lost as Support must request the information before being able to take action. TTR goes up. Customer satisfaction goes down.

Proposal

I propose a set of changes to improve the customer experience by redirecting as many requests as possible to be either internal requests or customer-submitted tickets:

  1. Update the Support Super Form as described in https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/support/support-team-meta/-/issues/7146+ to: "remove any references to "gratis", "prospect", etc., from the current "on behalf of" option in the form"
  2. Add a field to the "on behalf of" form that requires the submitter to select a request type from a list of possible items, where the list includes all of the Internal Request types and an "other"
    1. If the submitter selects one of the Internal Request types, then:
      1. switch to the internal request form
      2. display a pop-up saying, in essence, "oh yeah, what you want is an internal request; let me switch you to submitting one of those"; include an "ok" button to click before making the switch (no cancel, just ok)
  3. Add a required field to the "on behalf of" form that asks: "what is the reason that the customer is not submitting a ticket directly?"
  4. Add a required checkbox that confirms the submitter is aware that the "on behalf of" process might slow down resolution for the customer

DRI

@mdunninger will act as the DRI for this issue.

Required Resources

  • @gitlab-support-readiness/cust_support_ops_team will need to make the changes to the Support Super Form

Potential Roadblocks/Things to consider

  • We need to be sure the solution works well for the Field Teams, so I expect we'll need to bring in some representatives from there to review and contribute

Desired Outcome

What does success look like?

  • Big decrease in the number of "on behalf of" tickets
  • No more complaints from the team about tickets submitted using this form

How do we measure success?

Where would future feedback go?

Related Issues/MRs/Epics/Tickets

Related Tickets: