uControlSection — Request Categories
Section — Request Categories
What this section captures
Request Categories are the catalogue of things users can ask IT for — distinct from Incidents (which are faults). Examples: a new laptop, a software licence, VPN access for a contractor, an Office 365 mailbox, a name change after marriage. Each row is a hierarchical classification (typically Category / Sub-category / Item, but you can add as many levels as you need) plus the metadata that drives request behaviour.
Why it matters
The Request Category list is also the customer’s service catalogue — it becomes the dropdown they see in the ITSM portal when they raise a request. The better-organised and more comprehensive the catalogue, the less the help desk has to re-categorise misfiled requests.
Per-tab prefix
At the top of the page there is a single text input labelled Request category prefix. Whatever you type here is prepended to the Full Category of every row on this tab. The prefix is independent of the one on the Incident Categories tab — requests can have a different organisational anchor (e.g. Service Catalog / IT Services) from incidents.
Example: prefix Service Catalog + row levels Hardware / Laptops / New laptop produces a Full Category of:
Service Catalog / Hardware / Laptops / New laptop
Variable-length category levels
When adding or editing a row you’ll see a Category levels panel with one input per level. The first input is always Category; subsequent inputs are labelled Category (Level 1), Category (Level 2), and so on.
Five levels are shown by default on a new row.
Click + Add level to append more levels.
Click × to remove a level (from Level 1 onwards).
Empty levels are dropped on save.
Rows can have different depths — you don’t need to pad shorter rows with empty values.
The Full Category preview at the bottom of the form updates live to show prefix + populated levels joined with / .
How to fill it in
Set the prefix if your engagement uses one.
Click + Load defaults to seed the common request types — hardware, software, access, account changes, joiner / mover / leaver, facilities.
For each row, set:
Category levels — one to N entries describing the request hierarchy.
Code — ticket code (e.g.
REQ_NEW_LAPTOP).SLA, Impact, Urgency — defaults for this request type.
Group — the owning team.
Workflow, Immediate Workflow, Closing Workflow — the steps the request runs through. Most rows only need the main Workflow.
Use the per-row flags:
Cannot be requested — the row exists for technician use but isn’t shown in the customer self-service portal.
Allow changing groups — whether a technician can re-assign a request of this type to a different group.
Use the filter bar to find rows; bulk-select and Bulk apply to set values across many rows at once.
Bulk template — XLSX download & upload
The same spreadsheet round-trip available on the Incident Categories tab is here too:
↓ Template — downloads an XLSX with five category-level columns, optional Code, plus pre-populated dropdowns for SLA, Impact, Urgency, Group, Workflow, Immediate Workflow and Closing Workflow (sourced from your engagement’s other tabs).
↑ Upload — imports the edited file. Idempotent by levels; unknown labels insert with the field blank and a warning. Summary banner reports imported / duplicate / warning counts.
AI assistance
The same three AI features available on Incident Categories also live here, but the prompts are tuned for requests rather than incidents:
✨ Suggest items with topic Intune generates request rows like “enrol new device” and “reset Intune PIN” — planned asks, not faults.
✨ Suggest priorities applies typical request-side anchoring (hardware orders are low impact / low urgency; password resets escalate when self-service is unavailable). It also respects row selection — tick the rows you want classified, or leave none ticked to process every row missing one of the three priority fields.
See AI Features in TekReady.
EasyVista integration
For tenants on EasyVista, an admin-only panel at the top of the page exposes the JSON pull URL that EasyVista’s Easy Connect connector consumes. See Integrations — EasyVista catalog sync for the full setup walkthrough.
Common patterns
Joiner / Mover / Leaver | Always include all three. Most customers underestimate leaver volume. |
|---|---|
Hardware orders | One row per device family (laptop, monitor, headset, etc.) rather than one giant “Hardware request” row — it makes reporting more useful. |
Access requests | Separate rows for “new access”, “remove access” and “modify access” — same workflow rarely fits all three. |
Approval implications
This section follows the standard four-state approval lifecycle: Draft (editable) → Submitted (locked, awaiting the customer’s Manager) → Manager Approved (locked, awaiting the Partner approver) → Final (fully signed off and locked). A reviewer can reject the section back to Draft, with a reason, at either approval step.
Same as Incident Categories — this section is large, so lock Final only when the catalogue is realistically complete.