Service Level Agreement for Customer Support
Version May 2019 1.1
This Service Level Agreement defines level of standard and enhanced customer support that is provided to customers (‘you’) of adserve (‘our’) product and services.
1. Entitlement
Under the terms and conditions of service, found on the adserve website at www.adserve.com/terms you are entitled to Standard Support included at no additional charge. Standard support provides access to the adserve service desk during normal business so as to provide assistance with both break/fix and how-to support requests.
Standard Support entitles you to access a reasonable amount of support time per month. Support requests that you may make related to defects or bugs in the adserve products or services will not count against your monthly support entitlement and will be prioritized according to severity and impact.
Each customer can have up to three ‘Authorised Contacts’ who are able to submit and manage tickets on behalf of the company. You should therefore ensure that any end-user support requests are first raised with your Authorised Contacts who can collate similar problems experienced by other staff before raising these with adserve Customer Support.
Should you require additional support, then a bespoke ‘Enhanced’ support package can be designed at an agreed cost.
2. Service Desk Hours of Operation
Our Customer Service Desk is available Monday to Friday, from 9am to 5.30pm UK time. It is not available outside of these hours, at the weekend or public holidays.
We also provide an online support portal for submitting tickets, checking the status of existing tickets, finding support via self-service or through a number of support forums. This support portal is available 24 hours, 365 days per year.
3. Customer Support Channels
You may use a number of channels to engage with our Customer Support team, including via;
Due to the many additional services that are available via the online support portal, including the ability to submit and review the status of tickets outside of business hours and self-service options, it is recommended that you submit and manage all support requests via our online support portal.
4. What is included in Standard Support?
As a customer of our products and services you are entitled to Standard Support. Standard Support is defined as;
5. What may be included in Enhanced Support
If you require additional support in the usage of the software, including issues around data-loading, integration with other packages, or an increased number of How-To requests, we can create a bespoke support package for you at additional cost. Enhanced support may include, but is not limited to;
6. Enhancement Requests
We are very grateful for any and all customer feedback on our products and services, including suggestions as to how these can be improved. You may submit their feature or enhancement requests via the online support portal where such requests will be formally considered and prioritised by Product Management. Such enhancement requests should not be made directly on the Customer Services desk.
7. Incident & Problem Management
We use the ITIL classification of incidents and problems and provide guarantees of response according to the severity and impact of any support incident. Should they occur, you will report ‘incidents’ or occurrences of a customer support issue. Should we receive a number of such requests from multiple customers, then this will be designed a ‘problem’ and resolved accordingly.
8. How we Prioritize Incidents
Our response times depend on the priority of your issue or request. When you raise a ticket with us, we make an assessment based on the information you have given us. We let you know the priority we have assigned, but are happy to take extenuating circumstances into account, if you think we’ve got it wrong. Priority is based on two factors: severity and impact.
Severity
Severity determines how many people are affected by the incident you are reporting;
1. Entitlement
Under the terms and conditions of service, found on the adserve website at www.adserve.com/terms you are entitled to Standard Support included at no additional charge. Standard support provides access to the adserve service desk during normal business so as to provide assistance with both break/fix and how-to support requests.
Standard Support entitles you to access a reasonable amount of support time per month. Support requests that you may make related to defects or bugs in the adserve products or services will not count against your monthly support entitlement and will be prioritized according to severity and impact.
Each customer can have up to three ‘Authorised Contacts’ who are able to submit and manage tickets on behalf of the company. You should therefore ensure that any end-user support requests are first raised with your Authorised Contacts who can collate similar problems experienced by other staff before raising these with adserve Customer Support.
Should you require additional support, then a bespoke ‘Enhanced’ support package can be designed at an agreed cost.
2. Service Desk Hours of Operation
Our Customer Service Desk is available Monday to Friday, from 9am to 5.30pm UK time. It is not available outside of these hours, at the weekend or public holidays.
We also provide an online support portal for submitting tickets, checking the status of existing tickets, finding support via self-service or through a number of support forums. This support portal is available 24 hours, 365 days per year.
3. Customer Support Channels
You may use a number of channels to engage with our Customer Support team, including via;
- Online, using the adserve Support Portal at www.support.adserve.com
- Telephone, by calling 020 7177 0000 and selecting Option 2
- Email, by sending an email to support@adserve.com
Due to the many additional services that are available via the online support portal, including the ability to submit and review the status of tickets outside of business hours and self-service options, it is recommended that you submit and manage all support requests via our online support portal.
4. What is included in Standard Support?
As a customer of our products and services you are entitled to Standard Support. Standard Support is defined as;
- Notification and resolution of bugs or errors in the service, including misfunction, performance, security or stability issues. There is no cap to the number of support requests that you can make as they relate to bugs or errors in the service.
- How-To Requests, in which we can provide guidance as to how to use our software and services. Your ‘Authorised Contact’ are entitled to a reasonable number of ‘How To’ requests each month. Should this number be breached, you will be recommended to take additional product training or subscribe to an Enhanced Support package.
5. What may be included in Enhanced Support
If you require additional support in the usage of the software, including issues around data-loading, integration with other packages, or an increased number of How-To requests, we can create a bespoke support package for you at additional cost. Enhanced support may include, but is not limited to;
- Additional Authorised Contacts who can raise support tickets on behalf of the company
- Assistance with data-loading for RAJAR
- Assistance with submitting JET returns or other aspects of JET reporting
- Onsite setup and maintenance of the equipment used to run our software
- Extended or out-of-hours support
6. Enhancement Requests
We are very grateful for any and all customer feedback on our products and services, including suggestions as to how these can be improved. You may submit their feature or enhancement requests via the online support portal where such requests will be formally considered and prioritised by Product Management. Such enhancement requests should not be made directly on the Customer Services desk.
7. Incident & Problem Management
We use the ITIL classification of incidents and problems and provide guarantees of response according to the severity and impact of any support incident. Should they occur, you will report ‘incidents’ or occurrences of a customer support issue. Should we receive a number of such requests from multiple customers, then this will be designed a ‘problem’ and resolved accordingly.
8. How we Prioritize Incidents
Our response times depend on the priority of your issue or request. When you raise a ticket with us, we make an assessment based on the information you have given us. We let you know the priority we have assigned, but are happy to take extenuating circumstances into account, if you think we’ve got it wrong. Priority is based on two factors: severity and impact.
Severity
Severity determines how many people are affected by the incident you are reporting;
Severity |
Description |
Critical |
The whole company is being affected by this incident. |
High |
The whole department (e.g. planning, scheduling, finance) is being affected by this incident. |
Medium |
A team is being impacted by this incident, but other teams are operating without incident. |
Low |
An individual user is affected, but others on the same team don’t have the same problem. |
Impact
Impact determines the effect that the incident is having upon your business;
Impact determines the effect that the incident is having upon your business;
Impact |
Description |
Critical |
Critical business processes are stopped or producing significant errors. This is an issue that would be critical to your business. We understand the affect that will have, and it would be a top priority for us to fix |
High |
Important business processes are degraded. This is an issue that would be important to your business. We understand the affect that will have, and it would be a high priority for us to fix. |
Medium |
Business is degraded, but there is a reasonable workaround that you have identified. The level of priority would be decided by the severity of this. |
Low |
Service not quite working as expected, no business impact, but you wanted to let us know that things aren’t as they maybe should be. It is more of an irritation than a stoppage. |
Prioritisation Matrix
Any support incident we receive will be prioritised according to the following matrix;
Any support incident we receive will be prioritised according to the following matrix;
Impact Critical |
Impact High |
Impact Medium |
Impact Low |
|
Severity Critical |
1 |
1 |
2 |
4 |
Severity High |
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
Severity Medium |
2 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
Severity Low |
2 |
3 |
3 |
4 |
9. Response Times
We aim to deliver the following response times for all incidents reported to the service desk during our business hours;
Priority |
Our Description |
Initial Response Time |
Target Resolution (fix or work-around) |
1 |
Urgent |
Within 15 minutes |
24 hours |
2 |
High |
Within 1 hour |
5 days |
3 |
Medium |
Within 1 day |
30 days |
4 |
Low |
Within 1 day |
180 days |
Whilst there may be incidents that may not be capable of being resolved, via a fix or workaround, in the timescales above, as a service provider we hold ourselves accountable for these targets and measure our own performance against these.
10. Incident Reporting
Following all Priority 1 incidents we will produce a Priority 1 Incident Report which will detail the root cause of the incident, lessons learned and the steps we will be proposing to ensure such incidents are not repeated. This report will be sent to all customers who were affected by this incident together with our recommendations, which may include recommendations for you to also implement so as to reduce the risk of reoccurrence.
11 Escalation Plan
We always expect to meet our response times. However, should we fail to meet these response times, or we don’t provide you the level of excellent customer service that you should expect, then please escalate according to this escalation plan;
10. Incident Reporting
Following all Priority 1 incidents we will produce a Priority 1 Incident Report which will detail the root cause of the incident, lessons learned and the steps we will be proposing to ensure such incidents are not repeated. This report will be sent to all customers who were affected by this incident together with our recommendations, which may include recommendations for you to also implement so as to reduce the risk of reoccurrence.
11 Escalation Plan
We always expect to meet our response times. However, should we fail to meet these response times, or we don’t provide you the level of excellent customer service that you should expect, then please escalate according to this escalation plan;
Level |
Role |
Escalation Contact Details |
1 |
Customer Support Agent |
You are able to identify the specific support agent handling your support requests via the online support portal. |
2 |
Head of Customer Services |
Mel Buzzing at mel.buzzing@adserve.com or via telephone on 020 7177 0000 |
3 |
CEO |
James Foley at james.foley@adserve.com or via telephone on 020 7177 0000 |