Hold Please

I watch a fair amount of House MD reruns. You know the show – abrasive doctor who can diagnose illnesses that no one else can. He often writes on a white board all of the known symptoms; he calls this the “differential.”  I had to look up the term as it relates to medicine and here is what I found:  differential diagnosis is the characterization of the underlying cause of pathological states based on specific tests. At Blackbaud, I have the same idea; write all the “symptoms” on my whiteboard and determine the state of the patient (in this case, that’s you).

Everything you tell us is important. I’ve mentioned why in a previous blog. Other measurable data points that we can follow also give us insight. I tend to focus on support data, which keeps track of the number of chat sessions, amount of cases submitted and closed, and hold times. We do this so that we get a clear picture of the support you are receiving from us.

Lately, all hours of the day are not created equal when it comes to Support. There are certain times of day when we get the most calls (our “peak” times) and others when we are less busy. We have an amazing team and they want to be sure you get the best answer quickly. But, when many of you call in at once a queue may form and hold times rise. This is not to say “don’t call during these hours,” because we know that you call in when you have a free moment, but more to show you the trends we are seeing.

This graph is a mock up that represents what we normally experience on a given day of the week - high volumes of calls between 10:00 a.m. -11:30 a.m. ET and 2:30 p.m. – 4:00 p.m. ET:



If you have a question during these peak hours, you may want to contact us using chat or create a case on Case Central and we'll contact you. We have a very good turnaround time for our eSupport options and you’ll avoid phone support hold times. And we are all about saving you time.

Of course, the community is always available as well, where any question is answered not only by us but also by your peers who may have experienced your exact issue.

Spoiler alert: In the next release, we have completely revamped the help options within Altru. Without ruining the surprise too much I can tell you that while you are working in Altru, you’ll be able to search, chat, or create a case - all without leaving the system. This is just another one of our efforts to make things easier for you and save you time!