The USD Accelerator – Technical Guide

Introduction

Microsoft’s Unified Service Desk (USD) is a configuration-based framework that can be leveraged to help support the needs of agents in contact centres. USD provides a development environment that is powerful but requires a significant effort to initially implement.

Microsoft do provide sample packages that ship with USD, whilst these are useful as a learning / demonstration aid their functionality is limited. Additionally, Microsoft do not support these sample packages in production environments.

The USD Accelerator has been designed to address these issues by provided a feature rich interface which works with commonly used Dynamics 365 entities. Additionally, many features can be enabled / disabled by simply changing options.

Note: Unified Service Desk is fantastic tool! But we do now also have the Customer Service Workspace (CSW) app and Omnichannel for Customer Service. Before considering USD I do recommend that you review the newer CSW app as that might meet your requirements!

Note: USD and therefore The USD Accelerator have been designed with contact centres in mind however they can prove extremely useful in back office situations. Essentially it provides an ideal platform for any desk-based user.

Download Page

Download – You can download The USD Accelerator here.

Release History – I often make improvements to The USD Accelerator! They are detailed here.

Guide Contents

Overview – A High level description of The USD Accelerator

Approach to Demo, POC and Production – A description of how I have approach demos, POCs and production installs

Options – It is all about options! What are they and what do they do?

User Settings – Settings that control functionality specific to certain users

Full demo – In this video you can see a full demo of The USD Accelerator in action

Install Guide – A video showing how to install The USD Accelerator

Key Features Explained

  • Phone Call Features – How does The USD Accelerator handle phone calls?
  • User History – Logs details of sessions
  • Saved Sessions – Save your session and reopen later
  • Batch Mode – How to efficiently handle list of work
  • Queues – Often agents will work from queues
  • Pins – Pin details of opportunities and cases to speed data input
  • Admin Features – Access the USD Debugger and Best Practice Analyzer
  • KPIs – Show KPIs to your agent real-time in USD
  • Agent Scripts – How agent scripts can help make your agents more effective
  • Splash Screen – Why not personalize the splash screen as USD loads?
  • Configurations
    – How to apply different configurations on a user by user basis.
  • Knowledge Base
    – A description of how the knowledge base and feedback entities are implemented.
  • Canvas Apps – Two canvas apps exist. One can be used for contact verification whilst another shows announcements to agents.
  • Reliability options – features aimed at helping you keep USD running smoothly

Theory

Third Party Product Support

CaféX – Add web chat and more to Dynamics 365, See … https://www.cafex.com/en/products/live-assist/

QGate – Include CTI capabilities using QGate’s Intelli-Cti product. See … https://www.intellicti.com/


What If You Need Help or Training?

Implementing solutions in contact centres, even with The USD Accelerator can be a challenging undertaking. I would be happy to discuss your requirements in detail.

I am available on freelance basis to provide general USD training and consultancy. Plus, any training, support and consultancy services that are required connected with The USD Accelerator.

If you would like to discuss your specific project, please email me on neil.parkhurst@npdynamics.com