Hornbill Systems Supportworks Reviews

We're an IT service provider within the NHS and we use it for call logging, change management, problem management, CMDB, etc. We basically use the ITSM toolset, to service our user base.

The solution's business process flow is quite strong. Its reporting is quite good. The standard, basic ITSM functionality, like call logging and call flow, for example, are areas the solution really excels in. 

It's worked well for us for a significant period of time. However, we are kind-of outgrowing it at the moment. We're struggling a bit with making it meet our requirements.

The self-service and knowledge base are weak aspects of the solution. These need to be improved. We typically use other products to supplement this to try and help us meet those demands.

We've been using the solution for about eight years.

The solution is fairly stable. However, it begins to struggle a bit when you grow beyond a certain amount of users. It had worked quite well for us for eight years; it's just recently that we've begun to hit the limitations of the product.

The solution is fairly scalable, although after eight years we've hit a bit of a threshold in terms of the number of users the system can manage. We have about 200 support providers on the solution currently and about 18,000 end users.

The technical support that has been provided to us has been quite good. We've very satisfied with the level of support we've been provided.

We did previously use a different solution, but that was eight years ago, so I'm not sure of what it was.

The initial setup was fairly straightforward. Deployment only took about three weeks. It was a while ago since we set it up, however, I do remember it being fairly easy. Only two people were needed for deployment.

We had our own in-house team handle the implementation with the assistance of Hornbill.

We've definitely seen an ROI. 

We've had the system in place for eight years, and it's provided a solid platform for us to deliver our services during that period.

Our organization pays about $40,000 annually. There are ongoing consultancy costs and if we want to change anything, we're charged a day rate. Other than that, there are no other extra costs involved in working with the solution.

I'd advise others to map their processes out before starting with the solution.

Hornbill has recently generated a new version of its product and it meets some of the requirements that we would have been looking for. It's a bit more scalable, a bit more responsive to a customer-focused model for support, and they've improved a lot of things like process flow and self-service.

In terms of rating the solution, it's difficult to grade. It really depends on the size of the organization that's trying to use it as that tool. One of the reasons why we're looking to shift is because we've grown quite a bit over the years that we've had it, which makes it difficult for it to meet our demands. However, for an organization the size of what we were when we started our journey with it, I'd rate it ten out of ten. Where we are now, with our company size and needs, I'd rate it six out of ten. 

It is quite user friendly to use and has a lot of very useful features that makes the analyst/technician's life easier. From an Administrator's perspective, it has a lot of legacy code and table structures in its database that makes managing it, or pushing it to the limits of its capabilities, sometimes challenging. That said, if you have a locally installed version, the range of customization is impressive.

The Graphical Business Process engine provides a huge amount of flexibility and automation, and is one of its best features.

It has allowed us to bring call logging, change management and CMDB management into one tool, as well as providing a useful customer portal at the front end, so customers can log their own requests.

The customer portal is a tad dated and limited in some of its functionality. Also, the Knowledge Base could do with some improvements.

I've used it as a customer at three different organizations, the latest one I've been at over a year, and my job is purely to support this application and the people using it. Additionally, I was a software trainer at Hornbill for two years.

Out of the box, Supportworks isn't difficult to deploy or upgrade. However, once you start making customizations to the underlying data structure, future upgrades become more difficult.

At first we had a glitch where it would occasionally boot people out of their session, but that was because of a bug at our end, and not intrinsic to the software. Other than that, it is a very stable system and seldom, if ever, crashes.

We have 250+ users at the moment, and that might double soon. It's not an issue for Supportworks, and it doesn't require a lot of server space either. A good virtual server is all it needs and it will tick along quite happily.

I'd rate it as a 5/10 or 6/10. Four years ago, I would have given it an 11 or 12 (out of 10!). Individually, the people at Hornbill are fantastic and very helpful. But, I think the corporate approach to training and support has changed, meaning even small requests have to go through official channels which can be time consuming and costly.

Good, but can be variable. There are some fantastic people at Hornbill who know the product inside and out, but it is a very large and complex product to learn, and newer support staff don't always know the answers right away (which is normal for any organization).

I've worked at a number of organizations and used a range of service management tools. I accepted a contract with Hornbill to teach their product, because I felt it was the best one I've ever used. I still think it is one of the best two or three products on the market.

It can be a little bit complex, definitely something you want to get Hornbill to give a hand with, but mostly because there are a number of options, connectivity to external email, etc. I wouldn't say it is difficult, but there is a lot to it. Thankfully, installation is part of the purchase cost (if I remember correctly).

The Hornbill consultants who help install the software are top notch, highly recommended.

No idea on the financials, but it has improved our customer satisfaction with IT significantly.

Do as much of the work and customizations yourself as you can. Learn as much as you can about the product.