Help Desk solutions are an absolute must for a business or an enterprise and should be one of the first things they should invest in. All the complicated processes become simpler and it saves a lot of time and resources, making the business as a whole efficient. Agents and Supervisors are provided with huge relief and support with help desk tools around. It makes their job much easier and their desks clutter-free. If you are a new business owner, whether it is small or big, help desk software is one of the first things you should download and invest in.
What is a Help Desk platform?
A help desk platform is a very convenient query and problem management system which enables customers and staff to keep businesses in the loop with their problems and questions from point of contact until they reach a resolution. Ticket management, query management, and support are vital elements of a good Help Desk tool. The modern Help Desk solutions provide support through various channels of communication such as e-mails, chat support, websites, toll-free numbers, and SMS.
As we know Free and Open Source are the two most important elements business owners and webmasters look for when downloading software. This proves to be economical and provides freedom, which is essential when you are setting up a new business or a website. This blog will look into the best available option when it comes to free and open source help desk software solutions.
Finding the best Help Desk Software has always been among the top challenges for businesses when it comes to customer service. It all sums up customer-centricity. Before we move onto free and open source help desk software, let's have a look at one of the most popular help desk software.
HubSpot Help Desk Software
HubSpot Help Desk solution is a popular system for the customer support teams to stay aligned and structured. The following section will help you learn how you might best benefit from this software, how your team can use it, and more.
With the kind of customer, volume and velocity that the support team comes across every day, it gets challenging to extend the right kind of support and practice empathy without a system.
HubSpot's Help Desk & Ticketing software is explicitly designed to connect with customers and enhance their experience. The software makes it easy for the support team to document, organize, track, and resolve customers’ issues right from one single dashboard, that can be easily accessed by the entire team. The software is ideal for tracking and meeting all your customers’ service level agreements.
(Image Source: HubSpot Help Desk)
Key Features:
- Intuitive dashboard
- Easy to log in & organize customer records
- Track issues from one single dashboard
- Automated customer service process
- Prioritize request
- Facility to automatically convert emails into tickets
- Facility to deploy a survey and gather feedback
- Live Chat
- Conversational bots to add more value to your live chat facility
- In-built reporting
- Knowledge base
- Customer feedback and custom surveys
- Inbound and VoIP calling
- Omnichannel messaging
- Fully integrated CRM
- Service analytics
- Logged in visitor identification
HubSpot Help Desk & Ticketing software comes with a free version and one can avail the advanced tools by choosing the Starter package as low as $15 per month.
Besides HubSpot, we would also like to brief you about one of the most popular help desk tools known as - ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus.
ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus
ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus is a remarkably popular software when it comes to delivering extraordinary customer services. It provides centralized control and enhanced visibility over every IT issue to ensure that businesses deliver accurate and uninterrupted services to their clients. For more than a decade now, ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus has proven to be extremely user-friendly and effective for IT resources and stakeholders alike. Help desk ticketing is now effortless with the help of this software and thus adapting and using it would definitely benefit your business in terms of better productivity and profitability.
(Source: ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus)
Key Features
- Allows managing the entire life cycle of IT tickets accurately, ultimately leading to reduced outages, improved productivity of the agents, and delivering flawless services to the clients.
- Optimizes the utilization of the workplaces within your organization’s campus and at the same time helps in regularly monitoring the amenities and services provided to the clients.
- Ensures asset management, including inventory control, and keeps track of the software license renewal dates and purchases.
- Enables creating projects and managing resources, including tracking changes and progress of every project to deliver services to the clients within a stipulated time frame.
- Allows analyzing the root cause of the problem so that issues don’t arise repeatedly and there is a consistent boost in productivity.
Another one sophisticated help desk software is SuperOps, which is widely used for customer support and service functions as follows;
SuperOps
SuperOps is a prominent AI-powered help desk and support software that comes with features to remotely track, prioritize and resolve the requests of clients easily. It is widely used by project and customer support managers owing to the capabilities such as unified PSA-RMM functions, conversational support, contextual ticketing, intuitive reports, admin console, smart resource tracking, role-based access, etc. The tool helps businesses view entire ticket history in a single thread, put the ticketing process on autopilot, assign and schedule tickets, serve personalized canned responses, send recurring invoices to clients and many more to provide top notch and best quality customer support. It also comes with integrated billing, in-built quotes and robust security measures besides supporting integration with QuickBooks Online, QuickBooks Desktop, Xero, Stripe, Pax8, etc., for streamlined remote customer support and ticketing process.
(Source: SuperOps)
Features:
- Service desk software with modern ticketing
- Client management
- Contract management
- In-built invoicing and quote management
- Powerful workflow automation
- Turn existing processes into reusable runbooks
- Customizable reports with scheduling
- Centralized data sharing and storing
- Custom rebranding
- Automatic time-tracking
- Ticket assignment and scheduler
- SLA and invoice automation
- Canned responses
- Timed triggers
Now let us see the free and open source Help Desk solutions.
The Top 6 Free and Open Source Help Desk Systems are:
- HelpDeskZ
- UVdesk
- Faveo
- osTicket
- Free Scout
- Liberum
Help Desk Comparative Analysis Chart
Let us explore the listed free and open source help desk solutions with further details:
HelpDeskZ
HelpDeskZ is a PHP-based free and open source software that comes with an array of features. It comes with a simplified dashboard that stacks various functions and processes on a single screen. The messaging and mail functions are very convenient as well due to automatic pipelining. Its multilingual capability is very helpful as well. The personalization feature is very useful for agents and supervisors which enables them to personalize their dashboards, dashboard fields and message templates. HelpDeskZ is one of the most convenient and simplistic free and open source help desk software platforms out there.
(Source: HelpDeskZ)
Features:
- PHP-based system software
- Grouping function
- Bulk actions and query management
- Personalization
- Multilingual
- Message and mail piping
- Custom fields and templates
- Knowledgebase
- Canned responses
- Maintenance mode with custom message and status
- Auto close tickets
- User friendly interface
UVdesk
UVdesk is what a modern help desk tool is supposed to be. It makes running a business absolutely clutter free. Its seamless multi-channel support and social media integration is quite a boost over other help desk solutions. Task and Mail management is very simple and convenient for agents and supervisors. UVdesk is also mobile friendly so you can now manage your business even on the go. It also has an add-on feature for supervisors that enable them to examine the performances of agents in detail and work on it. Also, it comes with a Form Builder App and a File Viewer App for convenience. UVdesk follows all the top standards of security protocols to avoid data breaches.
(Source: UVdesk)
Features:
- Ticket administration
- Knowledgebase
- Agent performance examination
- E-commerce multi-channel integration
- Help desk migration
- Automated conditional workflow, event-based workflow and ticket assigning
- Email management with placeholders and predefined email templates
- Task creation by ticket threads
- Pending notification templates and status
- Customizable
- Multi channel support with Amazon Seller Central, email, website, etc.
Faveo
Faveo is another modernized help desk software system that can easily integrate with social media and mobile. SLA management is a very important feature of Faveo to strengthen customer and business relationships. It also enables agents to select Priority customers and manage them accordingly. Its huge in-built knowledge base and multilingual ability create a huge database. The ticketing system is seamless and has powerful functions such as Ticket Merging for the agents and Ticket Rating for the customers. The software can help businesses easily generate turn around time reports, ticket volume trend reports, performance distribution reports, help desk in depth and many more custom reports.
(Source: Faveo)
Features:
- SLA and priority management
- Responsive design
- Built-In comprehensive knowledgebase
- Multilingual
- Agent collision avoidance
- Ticket rating and merging
- Custom forms, status and ticket fields
- Canned responses
- API and In-App smart notifications
- Auto reply system
- Omnichannel integration
- Standard and customizable CSAT surveys
- Powerful analytics and reporting
osTicket
osTicket is another leading free and open source help desk software that comes with robust functionalities to maintain happy relationships with customers. The tool offers a data rich dashboard, configurable help topics, SLAs, ticket filters, customer support portal, etc., to deliver enhanced customer service and experience. It also comes with advanced customization capabilities to ensure scalability as per the requirements of the help desk department. osTicket is widely used for customer support owing to its abilities to route enquiries created through emails, APIs and web forms.
(Source: osTicket)
Features:
- Custom fields, columns and queues
- Ticket routing based on predetermined new ticket options
- Email integration
- Ticket locking mechanisms
- Easily assign, transfer and refer tickets
- Auto responder with configurable automated replies
- Create ticket/tasks through ticket threads
- Advanced search options
- Add collaborators to include external users
FreeScout
FreeScout is a free and open source PHP-based help desk software to provide professional customer support and help desk services at pocket friendly prices. Its modules for tags, saved replies, workflows, ticket number, end user portal, extended notifications, extended editor, etc., makes it quite popular among IT professionals and customer service departments. Not only this, but the software also supports integration with WooCommerce, easy digital downloads, Jira, LDAP, Slack, WhatsApp, Facebook and many more. The tool also leverages robust security measures, IP restriction, reCAPTCHA, spam filters and modern Microsoft Exchange authentication to safeguard user data.
(Source: FreeScout)
Features:
- Multilingual with 20+ languages
- Custom mailbox signatures
- Custom fields and folders
- Forward, merge and move conversations between mailboxes
- In-built collision detection
- Email integration
- Supports screen reader for visually impaired users
- Meilisearch for faster search
- OAuth & social login for support agents
- Mobile friendly
- Auto-refresh
- Custom mail-box signatures
Liberum
Liberum is a free and open source help desk software for IT departments and service providers of small and medium size. It offers a simple interface with the commonly required functions to manage and track customer issues. The software is completely HTML and ASP based, allowing easy customizations and modifications as per the business requirements. Some notable features of LIberum that sets it apart from others include active directory authentication, configurable email notifications, reopen closed tickets, fully customizable, etc.
(Source: Liberum)
Features:
- Multi-language support including Dutch, French, Spanish and German
- Knowledge base searching
- SQL full-text query support
- Ability to reopen problems
- Improved authentication and user management
- Support remote SMTP servers
- ASPMail support
- Private notes
- ADO connection handling
After going through the free and open source help desk software list, also take a look at the list of top the most reputed help desk software that can be used to implement premium help desk functionalities for better operational excellence.
List of Top Help Desk Software Commonly Used
Zoho Desk
Zoho Desk is a powerful help desk and support software that offers enhanced customization, security, extensibility and automation capabilities to scale as the business grows. Also, the omnichannel ticket management, multi-brand help center, embeddable self-service, time tracking, reporting dashboards, etc., makes it a perfect fit for startups, medium businesses and large enterprises. Zoho Desk also features Zia, an AI tool to auto tag tickets, perform sentiment analysis, deploy reply assistants, train ticket fields and do many more things. It comes with a free plan and premium pricing starts from $14 per user per month billed annually.
HelpDesk
HelpDesk is one of the most popular help desk systems to manage different types of tickets and customer queries at one place. One of the features that sets it apart from competitors is its HelpDesk AI solution. HelpDesk AI is a must have tool for the customer and IT support teams for ticket summarization, text enhancement, custom automation, translation, etc. The software also comes with other notable features for ticket management, team collaboration, customizations, communication, real time reporting and analytics, multi-channel support, custom canned responses, etc., to ensure hassle free help desk operations. Apart from a 14 day free trial, the premium pricing of HelpDesk starts from $29 per month per agent billed annually.
Zendesk Support
Zendesk Support is an AI-based help desk solution to personalize conversations, provide seamless help desk experience and build lasting relationships with customers. Customer support teams from almost all industries use this tool owing to its powerful capabilities such as ticket management, messaging, Prebuilt analytics dashboards, 1000+ integrations, pre-defined response, custom business rules, digital onboarding, etc. The premium pricing starts from $19/month with a 14 day free trial.
Help Scout
Another support tool that made it to the list of top help desk software is Help Scout, an unified platform for all ticketing and help desk needs. It comes integrated with AI, automation, collaboration, reporting, integrations and various other tools to help businesses efficiently manage issues and conversations of customers, partners, vendors and clients. Other notable features of Help Scout include advanced user permissions, shared inbox, multiple communication channels, workflow automation, knowledge base, pre-built and custom reports, etc. It is available for a free trial of 15 days with premium pricing starting from $20 per user. It comes in both monthly and annual subscriptions.
Hiver
Hiver is rapidly gaining traction among customer service, IT and help desk teams to provide reliable and efficient support to employees and customers. It greatly benefits businesses in improving the efficiency of the support team and quality of customer service owing to the features such as ticket assignment, escalation and tracking, SLAs, email management, workload distribution, reporting and dashboards, multi-channel support, integrations, etc. This software system also offers robust AI and automation capabilities with AI summarizer, rule based automation, round robin assignment, body search automations, AI bot, etc. The tool offers a 7 day free trial and premium pricing starts from $15 per user per month billed annually.
Industry-Wise List Of Top Help Desk Software
Help Desk Software for the Manufacturing Industry
Manufacturing industry is rapidly deploying modern help desk tools to automate manual and time consuming tasks, view centralized information, manage tickets, communicate production schedules, etc. Every manufacturer, from small to big, can use from the below listed top help desk software to support both internal and external support functions besides ensuring constant uptime and production.
HappyFox
When it comes to top help desk software for the manufacturing industry, HappyFox is a leading name in streamlining customer support, service desk and help desk operations with ease. It comes with a multilingual user interface to help manufacturers with vendor communication, multi-channel support, ticket categorizing and tracking, trouble ticket management, inter department collaboration, facility management, canned responses, task automation and many more functions. It also supports integration with HappyFox Chat, Salesforce, Microsoft Teams, Slack, Facebook, etc., to seamlessly perform help desk operations. The paid pricing starts from as low as $26 per user per month when opted for a 2 year savings plan.
HelpSpot
HelpSpot help desk software for the manufacturing allows businesses to efficiently manage queries associated with help desk, customer support, human resources, etc. It is an easy-to-use tool with a shared inbox, knowledge base, reporting, self service, email management, customizations, multi brand support, call center integration and many more features to speedily perform help desk tasks. The software also offers robust automation capabilities to track ticket changes, implement automation rules, automate ticket assignment, manage recurring tickets, etc. It is available in two packages which are professional and non profit/education. The professional package starts from $699 per year and the non profit/education package starts from $594 per year.
Freshdesk
Trusted by 60,000+ global customers, Freshdesk is a powerful help desk software supercharged with generative AI for providing omnichannel support, optimizing agent workload and rapidly resolving issues at affordable costs. This next-generation help desk solution is quite popular among small to huge manufacturing firms due to its easy ticket management features that includes agent collision detection, SLA management, ticket field suggestion, scenario automation, custom ticket status, etc. It also comes with parent child ticketing, time triggered automation, intelligent ticket assigning, solution article analytics, dashboards, custom reports and many more functionalities to improve help desk efficiency and performance. The software allows users to manage communication across the device in multiple formats. The free trial of this software is available for 14 days after which the premium pricing starts from ₹999 per user per month billed annually.
Help Desk Software for the Healthcare Industry
Help desk software optimized for the healthcare industry can do wonders in providing proper timely assistance to patients, observing regulatory requirements, enhancing internal operations and ensuring improved patient engagement. Designed with features such as automation, asset management, insights, etc., help desk software for the healthcare industry helps to resolve tickets in a timelier manner offering prioritized support. Patient support service, workflow management, and facilities management is just easier with such tools. The below-mentioned top help desk software for the healthcare organizations contributes to a smoother workflow, improved communication and better patient care.
Solarwinds Web Help Desk
Solarwinds Web Help Desk is a reliable software for automated ticketing management in the healthcare industry delivering timely and reliable customer, IT and help desk support. Hospitals and healthcare institutions use this software for prioritizing problems, ticket automation, centralized knowledge base, incident tracking, asset management, SLA reporting, etc. The tool can also be used for custom reporting, performance monitoring, scheduling automatic delivery via email and ticket routing. Solarwinds is available as both free and paid versions with paid licensing starting from $376 onwards. There is also a 14-day trial period.
WowDesk
Another handy help desk software for the healthcare industry is WowDesk which helps improve resource allocation, customer service аnd query tracking in healthcare based help desk departments. Hospitals, healthcare and medical institutions use this tool for inter departmental management, knowledge base management, omnichannel support, patient registration and contacts, follow-ups, self service, feedback collection, etc. One of the most unique features that differentiate it from the competition is its powerful workflow engine that is helpful in recording, tracking, managing and streamlining customer service and resolution processes. Besides the free version, WowDesk pricing starts from $6 per user per month.
ServiceTonic
Service Tonic is a multi-channel help desk tool for centralizing the support services, and optimizing healthcare ticketing systems. The tool offers easy to use features for IT service management, incident tracking, access requests, pharmacological incidence, preventive maintenance, compliance tracking, emergency response, hospital facilities management, etc., making it a good fit for big hospitals and healthcare research facilities. The software also offers ITIL best practices, customer service automation, asset management, multichannel help desk, self service, time control and various other functionalities to streamline the critical care required in the healthcare institutions. It comes in both on premises and cloud versions whose prices can be determined after a brief discussion with the vendor.
Help Desk Software for the Finance Industry
Security-dependent finance industry can seamlessly benefit from the help desk software systems designed specifically for finance services management. It helps in meeting client’s expectations, reducing churn, providing smooth guidance to the customers and eliminating support related challenges. Financial institutions, banks, brokerages, credit unions, etc., can use the below discussed top help desk software for the finance industry to streamline ticketing, enhance security and improve compliance for efficient customer support that foster trust and build stronger client relationships.
iSupport
Based in the U.S, iSupport is a top financial help desk software that comes with robust security, customizations and compliances functionalities. The software strictly complies with SEC, SOX, PCI and FESE requirements, eliminating any potential legal and compliance issues. It also supports manual configuration of custom forms, rules, integrations and workflows without involving any complexities. It also offers powerful permission-based dashboards and reporting functions to view meaningful KPIs in a visually appealing manner. For demo, free trial and pricing inquiries, connect with the company.
OneDesk
OneDesk is another leading help desk automation software to manage help desk tickets, customer billing, project tasks and many more functions from one application. It helps financial brokers, bankers, consultants, advisors and wealth managers with easy contact management, email management, client ticket management, automated workflow management, analytics and reporting, knowledgebase, personalized AI agent, tracking customer billing, etc. After a 14 day free trial, the premium plans start from $11.99 per user per month billed annually.
Deskpro
Deskpro is also a leading ticketing and help desk software for the finance industry designed to streamline customer support and elevate extra burden off the help desk teams. The core functionalities of this financial help desk tool includes self service, statistical insights, intelligent automation, controlled access and extensive customizations makes it a perfect choice for financial firms, banks and other relevant businesses. Other notable features of this tool include auto responder, multi agent chat and calls, round robin assignment, automatic routing, email abuse prevention, agent only fields, etc. It is available in both cloud and on premise versions with pricing starting from $29 per user per month.
Help Desk Software for the Retail and E-commerce Industry
The retail and eCommerce industry deals with a lot of customer queries on a regular basis which becomes hectic if not handled properly. In such a scenario, an ecommerce help desk software comes handy that can help retailers and eCommerce firms in streamlining the communication, quickly resolving the concerns, improving customer satisfaction, measuring agent productivity, making data driven decisions, etc., enabling better help desk support and omnichannel experience.
eDesk
eDesk is a top help desk system for the retail and eCommerce industry in effortlessly managing pre and post sales issues. This ecommerce help desk tool comes with a centralized dashboard with full order details, one click AI responses, one click invoicing, etc., allowing users to quickly manage the support tickets with ease. It also supports integration with leading listing platforms like Channel Advisor, Linnworks, BrightPearl, Skubana, etc. Automation capabilities include message filtering, rules for labeling, targeted response time, collision detection, etc. The premium plans of this tool start from $89 per month per user.
ProProfs Help Desk
Another tool that made it to the lists of top help desk software for the retail and eCommerce industry is ProProfs Help Desk. It is widely used by eCommerce businesses to offer multi-channel help desk service, automate workflow, rapidly organize and resolve tickets, promote self service, improve response time, monitor SLAs and easily view critical metrics. ProProfs customer service software for e-commerce also comes with features such as shared inboxes, notification templates, parent child ticketing, shared ownerships, audit and admin control, automatic email notifications, first response time reports, etc., for streamlined help desk support. The software has a free version. The premium pricing packages start from $99 per month.
DeskXpand
DeskXpand is unifiedeCommerce help desk system that offers a centralized place to manage customer requests, tickets and other queries. Its robust features include omnichannel helpdesk, eCommerce integration, in-depth helpdesk analytics, social media integration, live chat, one page ticketing, internal knowledge base, cohesive dashboard, etc. It can be used by departments ranging from sales, customer support and marketing to HR, and IT. Besides a 14 day free trial, the premium plans start from $14 per user per month billed annually.
Conclusion:
The above-discussed list of the top 6 free and open source help desk tools can help you significantly improve your help desk functions and would definitely make your business or enterprise efficient and systematic. Help desk software solutions are almost a compulsion for business owners today being a path-breaker to efficiency and profitability. You can even check the related software like Live chat software, collaboration software, customer service software and contact management software.
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