--- title: "We read 99 old requests and rebuilt every form to ask what we used to chase" description: "Our request desk now asks for the deadline, the other locations and the files up front, files every request on the location it is about, and stays in sync with the Jira desks our team already works in. Here is what is live, and the one part we have not proven yet." section: Inside Sneeze It author: David Steel published: 2026-10-10T20:15:03.987Z url: https://one.sneeze.it/blog/99-old-requests-rebuilt-into-forms tags: ["inside-sneeze-it", "hub", "request-desk", "jira", "franchise-marketing"] --- # We read 99 old requests and rebuilt every form to ask what we used to chase _Our request desk now asks for the deadline, the other locations and the files up front, files every request on the location it is about, and stays in sync with the Jira desks our team already works in. Here is what is live, and the one part we have not proven yet._ Most of the work an agency does for a multi-location brand starts as a request. New artwork for a grand opening. Pause the summer offer. A new manager needs access. Holiday hours on the Business Profile. The work itself is usually quick. The slow part is everything around it: the email back asking when it is due, which other locations it applies to, and where the files are. We wanted to know how much of that back-and-forth was built into the way requests reached us. So before we redesigned the request desk on the [Hub](https://hub.sneeze.it), we read 99 of our past help-desk requests from the previous six months and noted, for each one, what we had to go back and ask for. ## What 99 requests told us The same handful of questions showed up again and again, and none of them were hard. When is it due. Does it apply to other locations too. Where are the files. Is this related to something already in flight. Each one is a single sentence for the person asking and a whole round of waiting if it is missing, because the answer arrives on the next round of email. So every form on the desk now asks for those things up front: a deadline, the other locations it applies to, a link to the files, and a related ticket. Nothing clever. We simply stopped making the first reply a question. :::stats 99 | past desk requests read to redesign the forms 17 | request forms, each with its own questions 43 | older Jira requests linked into the Hub on day one, with 0 errors 55 | requests completed through the desk source: Sneeze It request desk records; completed count from the live [hub.sneeze.it](https://hub.sneeze.it) homepage, October 10, 2026 ::: ## Seventeen forms behind one button Every location page has a "+ Ticket" button. The first thing it asks is what you need: web, creative, a campaign, an offer, a club opening, TV and streaming, billing, account access, a new location, join-page and promo changes, a report, or something else. That choice rewrites the rest of the form. The questions change, the instructions change, and so do the approval line and the cost line, so a request that will need sign-off says so before it is sent rather than after. The request lives on the location it is about. A franchise's corporate team, a multi-unit owner and a single owner each see the requests for the locations they hold, moving from new, to in progress, to done. When we are waiting on the client, our "waiting on them" reads as "waiting on you" on their side, and a reply from them moves it back to in progress on its own. Nobody has to send a chaser to find out where something stands. :::compare "A request by email" "A request on the location" An email to whoever you know at the agency. The first reply asks for the deadline. The second asks which locations. The files are in a different thread. Status is whatever the last email said. --- A form chosen by request type, with the deadline, other locations, files and related ticket asked up front. The request sits on the location page with its status in the open, and a reply moves it forward without a chaser. ::: ## Who can read this ticket, and why Requests in a franchise system are not all for everyone. Each ticket has one of three audience levels: everyone on the location, everyone except the outside agency, or named people only. The middle one exists for money and vendor matters, which is why an outside agency working on the same location never sees those conversations. The ticket page names everyone who can read it and why, so nobody has to guess. A ticket you cannot see does not appear as "forbidden." It simply is not there for you. :::pullquote We stopped making the first reply a question. ::: ## We kept Jira, and made the Hub the front door Our team already works in Jira help desks, and moving them would have cost the team time with no benefit to a client. So instead of a migration we built a two-way link. Every ticket opened in the Hub also exists in Jira on the right desk, with the right request type and department. Comments and status changes flow both ways. A request emailed straight to a Jira desk comes into the Hub and finds its client by sender, contact address, club name or club id. If it cannot tell, the request waits in a "Which client is this?" queue for a person to pick, and the queue can remember the sender's domain for next time. :::flow "How a request moves" Location page | "+ Ticket" on the location the request is about Form | Questions, approval and cost lines set by the request type Hub ticket | Audience set, owner assigned by department Jira desk | Same ticket, same status, comments both ways Done | Visible to the client on their location ::: No AI decides where a request goes. Routing is plain rules, so the same request always lands the same way. Every department has a default owner, and anything without an owner for more than a day is listed for our staff. No ticket fails silently either: if one does not reach Jira, it is retried every 10 minutes, and the team gets one Slack alert per distinct problem rather than a flood. :::figure wide ![An agency workspace where a request card on a wall board slides from one column to the next, with a thin line running from it to a second, matching board on the opposite wall](/blog/media/2475f4ee92e8d8731c73fa81.jpg) One request, two boards: the Hub ticket and its Jira twin move together. ::: ## What is live, and what is not proven yet We would rather tell you exactly where this stands than round it up. :::callout note "Status as of October 10, 2026" **Live:** the 17 request forms (rebuilt September 30), ticket audience control (since September 19), the two-way Jira link (since September 30, with 43 older requests linked on day one), default owners by department, the 10-minute retry and alerts (October 6), and the offboarding ticket, which opens automatically when a client moves to offboarding (October 9). Our team can also file the same forms from Slack, one question at a time. **Switched on, not yet proven:** template projects. A club opening or monthly offer request is meant to build a whole Jira project from our team's templates. It is turned on, and as of our last check it had never been run against real Jira. Until it has, treat it as untested. **Coming:** an onboarding ticket to match the offboarding one, waiting on a choice of template. ::: The desk is one part of the location record we describe in [We rebuilt our portal around the location](/blog/we-rebuilt-our-portal-around-the-location). The Slack side of it, where our team files a request without leaving the conversation, is in [One in Slack updates the record](/blog/one-in-slack-updates-the-record). :::takeaways "What this means if you run 20 locations" - A request should ask for the deadline, the other locations and the files before it is sent. If your agency's first reply is a question, the form is the problem. - Requests should live on the location they are about, with status you can see without asking. - Money and vendor conversations should have their own audience, and the ticket should tell you who can read it. - Ask how a failed request is caught. "It retries and someone is alerted" is an answer. Silence is not. ::: :::cta Want to see the request desk on your locations? Book a walkthrough and we will show you the forms, the board and the Jira link on sample data. :::