Why IT support teams are divided into levels (L1, L2, L3)

As you probably already know, companies divide their technical teams into levels based on their employees’ expertise and experience. Usually, there are L1, L2 and L3 technicians.

This kind of internal organization helps both companies and clients. Typically, L1 technicians handle common situations, and if they can’t fix them, they pass the incident or request on to the L2 teams, which usually handle more advanced situations. These, in turn, can call on the L3 teams to handle complex scenarios that may have a major impact on the clients’ business.

L1 technicians:

L1 technicians have basic technical knowledge and limited access to the clients’ infrastructure.

Their main activities are:

• Centralizing incidents and adding them to the ticketing platform
• Taking calls from clients
• Answering emails
• Running basic diagnostics to determine the exact level of complexity and route the problem to the right team
• Creating tickets for L2 technicians
• Solving common problems and checking systems from a hardware and software standpoint
• If a situation can’t be fixed by following the procedures, it’s usually passed on to L2

L2 technicians:

L2 technicians solve the incidents escalated by the L1 team, after going through the diagnostic steps performed by the lower support level.

If not all the information is known, L2 technicians either send the incident back to L1 to request more information or contact the client to clarify all the details.

Once the request has been thoroughly documented, work on resolving it begins.

L2 technicians know the clients’ infrastructure very well and have extensive experience in IT support.

L3 technicians:

L3 technicians are experts in specific technologies (subject matter experts) and handle specific things. While L1 and L2 usually provide a generalist form of support, L3 teams handle problems of advanced complexity related to specific technologies.

They have greater access to the infrastructure than the L1 and L2 teams.

L3 technicians are usually responsible for identifying the root cause of the problem and often hand over the complete solution for L2 and L1 to implement.

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The benefits of dividing the technical team into levels

• Clients get fast answers
• Good communication with clients
• Optimized workflows
• Time-efficient problem handling, to meet SLAs
• Career advancement opportunities for the company’s employees

What is the difference between L1, L2 and L3, in short?

The difference comes down to the complexity of the problems and to access to systems:

• L1 takes the request, logs it and solves common problems by following procedures: a password reset, a printer that won’t print, a program that won’t start.
• L2 solves problems that require closer analysis and knowledge of the client’s infrastructure: servers, network, email, access rights.
• L3 are the experts in specific technologies: they find the cause of complex problems, design the permanent solution and, when needed, work directly with the manufacturer.

How does a ticket get from L1 to L3?

A ticket moves up to the next level only when the current level can’t solve it, and each level passes on to the one above what it has already checked, so nobody has to start from scratch.

For example, an employee can no longer send emails. The L1 technician checks the account, the password and the connection. If the problem affects all colleagues, the ticket goes to L2, who checks the email server or the Microsoft 365 settings. If the cause is still unclear, the ticket goes to L3, who identifies it and decides on the solution, which L2 or L1 then applies. The client sees a single ticket and gets updates along the way.

What does the level structure mean for RezolvIT clients?

For clients, it means a simple request gets solved quickly, and a complex one goes straight to the right person. At RezolvIT, the response time is at most 15 minutes by phone and at most one hour remotely, and we’re on site within 2 – 4 hours, depending on the plan. Clients receive a monthly report and, depending on the plan, a dedicated IT manager. The details are on the helpdesk and IT plans pages.

RezolvIT is an IT support company organized into levels (L1, L2, L3), with a workflow based on ITIL concepts. This way of organizing lets the company respond promptly to every client request and resolve it while meeting its SLAs.