Case relationships
Service center users can manage relationships between cases. Relationship types include parent-child and related.
Cases that center on a single issue and that can be resolved simultaneously and at the same time can be linked in a parent-child relationship. A case is designated the parent, and one or more cases can be linked to that case as children. Child cases of the same parent are indicated in the system as siblings.
The parent/child feature can be used when a service center opens multiple cases about a common issue. For example, an agent who receives multiple calls about a server outage can open a case for each call. The agent can link the cases through the parent-child relationship. When the issue is resolved, agents close the child cases. All agents can close child cases individually before closing the parent. Agents who have parent-child cascade closing rights can close all child cases simultaneously with the parent case. Service center users can choose to have the close case email notification sent to the employees who are associated with the child cases. An agent who does not have parent-child cascade closing rights must close all child cases individually before closing a parent case.
Parent/Child Cases
- by adding the parent to a case (See Adding a parent to a case.)
- by cloning a case with similar attributes (See Case cloning.)
- by creating a designated parent case from scratch
When an agent adds a note to a parent case, the agent has the option to automatically copy the note to all open child cases. If case note editing is allowed, then updates to a note are copied to the open child cases as a new note.
The standard business rule dictates that a parent case cannot be closed until all of its child cases are closed. This rule can be overwritten for various service center roles so that service center users can close a parent and pending child cases simultaneously. This is referred to as cascading case closing rights. These rights are determined by service center user role.
Related Cases
Related cases are cases that have no dependencies but have been related for informational purposes. When you relate cases, it is important to state the reason that the cases are related. This information can be added to the Reason field.