Philippines staffing blog ·
Retire an outdated help desk article safely
Remove misleading guidance without breaking findability, losing the reason for retirement, or leaving a known gap ownerless.
Direct answer
An article should be retired when its steps no longer match the service, its source is no longer authoritative, or its scope creates unsafe use. Record the trigger and preserve a short internal rationale so the same guidance is not recreated from memory.
Before removal, identify links, macros, search terms, and ticket types that depend on the article. Replace it with a current source or a clear holding page when customers still need a route, and assign the owner responsible for the missing guidance.
Do not hide a broken answer by deleting its public page while leaving specialists to improvise. Keep account, security, money, and policy boundaries explicit during the transition.
Review tickets after deprecation for failed searches and wrong substitutes. The result should show whether the replacement is findable, accurate, and owned, not merely whether the old URL disappeared.