The old process is not broken, however, it is cumbersome. It takes one and sometimes two Test Coordinators to be the vehicles for the process. It is something that has to be monitored at all times because if the Test Coordinator is not actively monitoring the system then a defect can stay without being dealt with for a long time.

This will speed up the process because the process itself will drive the defect report, not an individual. 

Teams of individuals can monitor the system, and thus it will not bog down waiting for an individual to move the issue through. 

Twice every day, the ICOA team spoke with Astea on a conference call in an effort to learn the status on existing issues. 

With Remedy, this tracking can be done through a simple query or report. Though the Conference calls can and likely will continue, the focus can be shifted from tracking to problem solving, and from updating tickets to reviewing results. Essentially it will be time better spent. 

Whenever a patch failed the retest, a new case was created. The reason for this is that the Control Sheet would lose the historical data when the new information was placed into the system. 

The Remedy system allows for limitless information to be input into the Call Log field, and up to five different patch attempts can be individually reported in the case. In this way the history is preserved, and the path that was followed the last time the patch was created can be reviewed easily. Literally it allows us to learn from the past, and can save time in tracking the issue, and in fixing the issue. 

The case reference number is not changed, and a new case is not created, so the audit trail of the process cycle will be documented and easy to access. 

Phone calls or Emails was the only way that individual who reported the issue could learn the status of the case. The Control Sheet was patrolled primarily by the two Test Coordinators. 

Anyone who has access to Remedy can pull up and review a case, and anyone who does not have access to Remedy can go to the World Wide Web and pull the information into the web browser for review. 

The defect was fully documented on the Defect Report document, and some of that information was placed into fields on the Control sheet. 

With Remedy, it's all entered in the same place, and with the author's direct verbiage. 

A European user would contact the Help desk with any errors or defects that are found, and it would then be translated into the Defect Report document to be Emailed to the Test Coordinator. 

With the new process, the Help desk already uses Remedy as their tracking tools for end user reported problems. With the new process they'll be able to forward that same documentation into the hands of ICOA. 

To Summarize

Remedy is more flexible in many ways than the current system. 

Remedy is more accessible than the current system. 

Remedy can police itself with the procedure, and only requires monitoring. 

Remedy was developed for this purpose: It is a problem tracking tool.