ITSM Recommendations
Posted by ThrowawayUK93@reddit | sysadmin | View on Reddit | 30 comments
Hi all,
I’ve recently started a new role and have been asked to source a new ITSM tool for a college in the UK.
The current system is very basic and not suitable. Budget is at the low end of five figures per annum.
I’ve previously used Jira (on-prem and cloud) and had no major issues, but I’m not convinced it’s the right fit for this environment.
Our setup:
- \~4,000 students, \~600 staff
- IT team of 10
- MIS (student data/databases) team of \~10
- Potential inclusion of Estates/Facilities (\~5)
- Around 25–30 agents total
What we’re looking for:
- Full ITSM support (Incident, Request, Problem, Change)
- Easy to use, maintain and expand/develop (not reliant on one person)
- Good reporting / dashboards for management to review
- AI features for trends, categorisation, etc.
- Clean multi-department support (IT, MIS, Estates)
- CMDB / asset management
- Knowledge base
- SLA management and reporting
- Solid support
So far I’ve narrowed it down to:
- Freshservice
- HaloITSM
I’ve also looked at ManageEngine's ServiceDesk Plus (used their asset tool before), but feel it may be better suited once we’re more mature.
I’m currently booking demos with Freshservice and HaloITSM but wanted to ask if any other ITSMs are worth considering at this scale?
Thanks in advance.
Such_Rhubarb8095@reddit
We moved to monday service for a similar size college and it's handled incident, change, and asset management without any headaches. the dashboards are clear, management loves the reporting, and it's easy for different teams to use. plus, the AI powered categorisation has sped up our process. definitely book a demo for monday service or if you want a an alternative to freshservice and haloitsm.
tifu_tifu_1000@reddit
Take a look at Inv͏Gate Ser͏vice Manag͏ement. We evaluated it against fresh and it checked most of the same boxes but was way easier for non-technical people to maintain. The no-code workflows meant our facilities team could set up their own request types without bugging IT every time.
Since you're dealing with students, you should be dealing with asset managent to, where invgate has a plus. It’s a lifesaver for the chromebook chaos schools usually face. Instead of just seeing license counts in the google admin panel, you can actually track the hardware lifecycle. It links loaner serial numbers to repair tickets so you aren't hunting students down to get your gear back, and since devices are tied to specific students, you'll know exactly which serial number to brick the second a student withdraws or fails to return it at graduation. Plus you can track how many times a specific unit has been fixed to see if it’s actually worth repairing again.
For 25 agents on a college budget it should land well within your price range. It bridges the gap between what you built and what’s actually out in the wild.
Suspicious_Drummer27@reddit
Both Freshs͏ervice and Halo͏ITSM are solid picks for that scale, you really cant go wrong with either for a college environment. HaloITSM tends to be more popular in UK education from what ive seen so you might get better references there.
One I'd throw in the mix is Inv͏Gate Ser͏vice Manag͏ement, we use it with about 20 agents across multiple departments and the multi-department setup was surprisingly painless. reporting dashboards are decent out of the box which sounds like something your management cares about. Also maybe worth a look at ee͏sel A͏I if you want to bolt on AI stuff to whatever you end up picking, though most of the ITSM tools are baking that in natively now anyway.
Biggest advice though is make sure you get a proper trial environment not just a sales demo, because the "easy to maintain" part is where a lot of these tools fall apart. Jira cloud could technically do it all but youre right that its not a great fit for non-technical end users like estates staff
FeaturebaseApp@reddit
Featurebase! You can try it for free and let me know what you think!
mattberan@reddit
Highly recommend you check us out. We know you are probably bias for Halo though ;)
We're called InvGate. We just did a demo for a college in the UK and they wish they had found us sooner.
We're kind of a no-bullocks kind of company; pricing is on our site, 30-day free full-feature trial... and most of our customers go live in less than 30 days. Your size would probably be the full 30 if we had enough resources... probably pushing it through depending on your specific scenario.
Check out - DMs are open
Google me or find us on YouTube to see more.
Hope you get what you need!
casetofon2@reddit
GLPI. Do GLPI .... Way cheaper than most things out there.
PlatypusDependent661@reddit
I really don't like GLPI, maintenance and configuration are way too high effort and UX and UI is terrible
casetofon2@reddit
I mean I'm working on a feature request that if accepted will improve the way maintenance and config is handled. Fingers crossed !
ledow@reddit
I second this.
Very, very powerful.
PlatypusDependent661@reddit
Siit is a strong fit for your setup if you prioritise simplicity, automation, and multi-department collaboration.
Trade-off: lighter on CMDB and deep ITIL features compared to Freshservice or HaloITSM.
No-Table-4213@reddit
I will recommend ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus, it has both option on prem/ cloud!
Pretty-Fox1855@reddit
Olá,
Sou fundador de um novo Itms, www.coreitsm.xyz, teria muito gosto em fazer um demo.
Veja o nosso LinkedIn www.linkedin.com/company/110762159
alraffa218@reddit
Go with ManageEngine SDP Standard Edition first 2 months and later on upgrade to other editions once you mature on the stated modules.
Let me know if you need any further assistance in choosing the right edition.
WashOdd7330@reddit
Freshservice and HaloITSM are both solid picks at your scale, HaloITSM especially if you want deep ITIL compliance out of the box. One other worth throwing into your demo list is Siit.io. Handles multi-department ticketing well, has solid AI categorisation and reporting, and doesn't need a dedicated admin to keep it running.
wutanglan90@reddit
ManageEngine Service Desk Plus is excellent across the board.
FreshService is good but the Project module is hot ass. If you don't need it however then it's moot.
furstimus@reddit
Could be worth looking at UniDesk since it’s education, I haven’t used it in a while though so can’t say how it’s performing recently.
Nnyan@reddit
I’ll say this I’m not impressed with FreshService. It would help if you identified your current solution.
I’ve been very impressed with HaloITSM, Team Dynamics, Jira SM, Harmony ITSM, and Monday.com.
ThrowawayUK93@reddit (OP)
Our current system is inhouse and extremely basic.
Warm_Share_4347@reddit
siit is good and has a program for education org
ThrowawayUK93@reddit (OP)
Thanks everyone for your input and suggestions, it’s been really helpful.
I’ve now requested demos with GLPI and Xurrent to see how they compare alongside the others.
One thing I will say is that Xurrent have been the only provider so far to actually ask what we’re trying to achieve as an organisation before booking a demo, rather than just sending over a meeting invite.
Interested to see how they come across in the demo itself.
BWMerlin@reddit
GLPI is free and open source.
cruzziee@reddit
Freshservice has crazy workflow automation. Miss using that ticketing portal.
donith913@reddit
It’s been a long time now, but I purchased Freshservice 9-10 years ago for a 4000 student university in the states when I was a help desk manager and really liked the tool, especially for what it cost. If you’re too small for ServiceNow, Freshservice is my go-to.
cruzziee@reddit
lol you literally summarized it perfect with the last sentence. we ended up switching from servicenow to freshservice due to the complex controls servicenow had and we didn't have a dedicated ITSM engineer nor was our org big enough to justify having a consultant come in and set it up properly. Freshservice was easily deployed and configured with the onboarding team.
Jeff-J777@reddit
We use FreshSerivce I would say it checks of a number of boxes you are looking for. But for solid support that is nonexistent. For us support has been nothing but horrible. Then they tent to implement changes that break things and I question their DEV team.
For some reason FreshService defaults all these cloud fields for hardware assets. It makes their asset platform bad. Just an example for a printer I have virtual subtype, availability zone, and region fields for a printer. Some other hardware profiles have more. You can't remove them you can't hid them. But FreshService thinks these hardware profiles need all these cloud fields. It just adds garbage data.
The ticketing platform is solid. Reporting would depend on which plan you go with. The lower plans have just standard reports you can generate the higher plans have custom reports.
But we used the projects module and that was trash, it was a basic Microsoft Planner setup. We could not even tie a tickets to projects.
Most likely in 2027 we will move off FreshService to either another platform, or just bring it in house.
DeifniteProfessional@reddit
It's taken me 3 months to get a demo with Freshservice, which fills me with confidence
Sorbicol@reddit
I was part of a business divestment a few years ago and a big part of the work I did was sourcing and establishing a brand new ITSM tool from scratch. We settled on Freshservice, and it was one of the few packages we went with that nobody regularly complained about. We took that as a good sign.
poizone68@reddit
Personally I've found ITSM requirements can be narrowed down to:
- People reporting an issue must not hate interacting with the system
- People working on tickets must not hate interacting with the system
This usually puts a cap on what you can ask the ITSM solution to do. It is tempting to have the "one solution to rule them all", but since you rarely have influence over the product development you will often find that one or two or more modules have significant shortfalls and you resort to finding alternatives for these.
hirschaj@reddit
I suggest you add Xurrent to your list. It definitely meets your list of requirements. I'd also suggest you look for analyst reports to help you filter through the differences between the various solutions. There are a ton of ITSM companies and you don't want to waste a bunch of time implementing the wrong solution for your needs. One final suggestion, you should also start to get more granular with you list of needs so it is easier to assess each solution for their differences.
afahrholz@reddit
Sounds like a solid plan, focus on ease of use, reporting and multidepartment support to see what fits your team best.