ticket-triage

What this skill does

# /ticket-triage

> If you see unfamiliar placeholders or need to check which tools are connected, see [CONNECTORS.md](../../CONNECTORS.md).

Categorize, prioritize, and route an incoming support ticket or customer issue. Produces a structured triage assessment with a suggested initial response.

## Usage

```
/ticket-triage <ticket text, customer message, or issue description>
```

Examples:
- `/ticket-triage Customer says their dashboard has been showing a blank page since this morning`
- `/ticket-triage "I was charged twice for my subscription this month"`
- `/ticket-triage User can't connect their SSO — getting a 403 error on the callback URL`
- `/ticket-triage Feature request: they want to export reports as PDF`

## Workflow

### 1. Parse the Issue

Read the input and extract:

- **Core problem**: What is the customer actually experiencing?
- **Symptoms**: What specific behavior or error are they seeing?
- **Customer context**: Who is this? Any account details, plan level, or history available?
- **Urgency signals**: Are they blocked? Is this production? How many users affected?
- **Emotional state**: Frustrated, confused, matter-of-fact, escalating?

### 2. Categorize and Prioritize

Using the category taxonomy and priority framework below:

- Assign a **primary category** (bug, how-to, feature request, billing, account, integration, security, data, performance) and an optional secondary category
- Assign a **priority** (P1–P4) based on impact and urgency
- Identify the **product area** the issue maps to

### 3. Check for Duplicates and Known Issues

Before routing, check available sources:

- **~~support platform**: Search for similar open or recently resolved tickets
- **~~knowledge base**: Check for known issues or existing documentation
- **~~project tracker**: Check if there's an existing bug report or feature request

Apply the duplicate detection process below.

### 4. Determine Routing

Using the routing rules below, recommend which team or queue should handle this based on category and complexity.

### 5. Generate Triage Output

```
## Triage: [One-line issue summary]

**Category:** [Primary] / [Secondary if applicable]
**Priority:** [P1-P4] — [Brief justification]
**Product area:** [Area/team]

### Issue Summary
[2-3 sentence summary of what the customer is experiencing]

### Key Details
- **Customer:** [Name/account if known]
- **Impact:** [Who and what is affected]
- **Workaround:** [Available / Not available / Unknown]
- **Related tickets:** [Links to similar issues if found]
- **Known issue:** [Yes — link / No / Checking]

### Routing Recommendation
**Route to:** [Team or queue]
**Why:** [Brief reasoning]

### Suggested Initial Response
[Draft first response to the customer — acknowledge the issue,
set expectations, provide workaround if available.
Use the auto-response templates below as a starting point.]

### Internal Notes
- [Any additional context for the agent picking this up]
- [Reproduction hints if it's a bug]
- [Escalation triggers to watch for]
```

### 6. Offer Next Steps

After presenting the triage:
- "Want me to draft a full response to the customer?"
- "Should I search for more context on this issue?"
- "Want me to check if this is a known bug in the tracker?"
- "Should I escalate this? I can package it with /customer-escalation."

---

## Category Taxonomy

Assign every ticket a **primary category** and optionally a **secondary category**:

| Category | Description | Signal Words |
|----------|-------------|-------------|
| **Bug** | Product is behaving incorrectly or unexpectedly | Error, broken, crash, not working, unexpected, wrong, failing |
| **How-to** | Customer needs guidance on using the product | How do I, can I, where is, setting up, configure, help with |
| **Feature request** | Customer wants a capability that doesn't exist | Would be great if, wish I could, any plans to, requesting |
| **Billing** | Payment, subscription, invoice, or pricing issues | Charge, invoice, payment, subscription, refund, upgrade, downgrade |
| **Account** | Account access, permissions, settings, or user management | Login, password, access, permission, SSO, locked out, can't sign in |
| **Integration** | Issues connecting to third-party tools or APIs | API, webhook, integration, connect, OAuth, sync, third-party |
| **Security** | Security concerns, data access, or compliance questions | Data breach, unauthorized, compliance, GDPR, SOC 2, vulnerability |
| **Data** | Data quality, migration, import/export issues | Missing data, export, import, migration, incorrect data, duplicates |
| **Performance** | Speed, reliability, or availability issues | Slow, timeout, latency, down, unavailable, degraded |

### Category Determination Tips

- If the customer reports **both** a bug and a feature request, the bug is primary
- If they can't log in due to a bug, category is **Bug** (not Account) — root cause drives the category
- "It used to work and now it doesn't" = **Bug**
- "I want it to work differently" = **Feature request**
- "How do I make it work?" = **How-to**
- When in doubt, lean toward **Bug** — it's better to investigate than dismiss

## Priority Framework

### P1 — Critical
**Criteria:** Production system down, data loss or corruption, security breach, all or most users affected.

- The customer cannot use the product at all
- Data is being lost, corrupted, or exposed
- A security incident is in progress
- The issue is worsening or expanding in scope

**SLA expectation:** Respond within 1 hour. Continuous work until resolved or mitigated. Updates every 1-2 hours.

### P2 — High
**Criteria:** Major feature broken, significant workflow blocked, many users affected, no workaround.

- A core workflow is broken but the product is partially usable
- Multiple users are affected or a key account is impacted
- The issue is blocking time-sensitive work
- No reasonable workaround exists

**SLA expectation:** Respond within 4 hours. Active investigation same day. Updates every 4 hours.

### P3 — Medium
**Criteria:** Feature partially broken, workaround available, single user or small team affected.

- A feature isn't working correctly but a workaround exists
- The issue is inconvenient but not blocking critical work
- A single user or small team is affected
- The customer is not escalating urgently

**SLA expectation:** Respond within 1 business day. Resolution or update within 3 business days.

### P4 — Low
**Criteria:** Minor inconvenience, cosmetic issue, general question, feature request.

- Cosmetic or UI issues that don't affect functionality
- Feature requests and enhancement ideas
- General questions or how-to inquiries
- Issues with simple, documented solutions

**SLA expectation:** Respond within 2 business days. Resolution at normal pace.

### Priority Escalation Triggers

Automatically bump priority up when:
- Customer has been waiting longer than the SLA allows
- Multiple customers report the same issue (pattern detected)
- The customer explicitly escalates or mentions executive involvement
- A workaround that was in place stops working
- The issue expands in scope (more users, more data, new symptoms)

## Routing Rules

Route tickets based on category and complexity:

| Route to | When |
|----------|------|
| **Tier 1 (frontline support)** | How-to questions, known issues with documented solutions, billing inquiries, password resets |
| **Tier 2 (senior support)** | Bugs requiring investigation, complex configuration, integration troubleshooting, account issues |
| **Engineering** | Confirmed bugs needing code fixes, infrastructure issues, performance degradation |
| **Product** | Feature requests with significant demand, design decisions, workflow gaps |
| **Security** | Data access concerns, vulnerability reports, compliance questions |
| **Billing/Finance** | Refund requests, contract disputes, complex billing adjustments |

## Duplicate Detection

Before creating a new ticket or routing, check for duplicates:

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