Knight Frank LLP, the leading independent global property consultancy, has invested in Hornbill's Supportworks ITSM to provide IT support to over 1,700 staff based at offices in the UK, Ireland, Germany and Italy, with the intention to roll it out to all overseas operations. The UK IT service desk chose Hornbill's solution because it is a fully ITIL compatible service management tool , which also offers a self-service solution. Since the introduction of Hornbill's Customer SelfService portal, over 75% of all new incidents are logged via the web, of which 97% are responded to within the team's target of five minutes.

"We chose Hornbill's Supportworks for its simplicity and flexibility, as well as its support of our ITIL processes. It was easily integrated with our existing systems and offered excellent value for money,” said Phil Hurcom, IT Problem Manager at Knight Frank LLP.

"We have been delighted with the way that self-service has been adopted by users. We have been able to improve our service significantly, without increasing our headcount. We intend to continue promoting the service and roll it out internationally. We have set our sights on 100% of tickets being raised through the system."

The UK service desk is managing calls for the other European offices. The more efficient service allows Knight Frank employees to remain focused on core fee-earning activities, instead of wasting time chasing up service calls, as they now have instant visibility of their status through the self-service portal.

Regular management reports, which used to take the Service Desk Manager two days per month to prepare, are now scheduled to run automatically. Summary reports are also prepared for senior management covering all global IT issues managed by the UK service team. The IT team has also started building up a central repository for asset data to create a Configuration Management database (CMDB).

The success of Supportworks in IT has seen the introduction of its use by the HQ Facilities Management team. The system also provides first line support for the marketing department, for queries relating to the company intranet, as well as by the accounts team for its online expenses service.

"There is no doubt that Supportworks ITSM has delivered business benefits far beyond our original business case and has met our primary goal of reducing the number of follow up calls that had to be handled by service desk staff. The efficiencies gained, as well as the reduced administrative burden through automating processes, have enabled us to achieve so much more. The unexpected success of self-service has resulted not only in savings of call costs and time, but also improved customer satisfaction," added Hurcom.

Gerry Sweeney, CEO of Hornbill Systems, commented: "Adopting an ITIL framework enables IT departments to respond to service requirements in a much more structured way. Where IT departments have many users to support over disparate locations, a service management tool helps them to deploy their resources in an effective way and to do more with less.
Automating processes reduces the administration burden on service desks enabling them to provide a more responsive and proactive customer service. A self-service portal can also release the service desk to prioritise calls, reducing call times and costs."

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NOTES TO EDITORS

About Knight Frank LLP
Knight Frank LLP is the leading independent global property consultancy. Headquartered in London, Knight Frank and its New York-based global partner, Newmark Knight Frank, operate from 207 offices, in 43 countries, across six continents. More than 6,340 professionals handle in excess of US$886 billion (£594 billion) worth of commercial, agricultural and residential real estate annually, advising clients ranging from individual owners and buyers to major developers, investors and corporate tenants.

For further information about the Company, please visit www.knightfrank.com