The service level agreement

• It is a contract that establishes the responsibilities and obligations between a company and its client.
• It became common in the business relationships of technology and service companies with their customers and third parties, but over time it became widespread in all sectors

What is a service level agreement

A service level agreement, or SLA for its acronym in English (service level agreement), is a contract that establishes the responsibilities and obligations between a company and its client, including the expectations related to the quality of the service provided.

This contract includes metrics such as uptime, delivery time, response time, and resolution time. An SLA also determines the action to be taken when the stipulated requirements or objectives are not met.

It is used to establish indicators that can be measured to regulate the service offered and thus ensure compliance with what the client expects. This document became common in the commercial relations of technology and service companies with their clients and third parties. But, over time, its applications have expanded to other sectors.

Types of service level agreements

There are three different types:

customer based

It collects the needs, characteristics and expectations of the particular client with whom the agreement or contract will be signed. It must be prepared very carefully, due to the level of detail it incorporates, so it probably won't be possible to use it with another client.

service based

This type of agreement has an opposite approach to the previous one, since the SLA will be shared with all clients with an equivalent service.

multilevel

When you combine customer-based and service-based agreements, then you have a multi-level SLA. Its objective is to describe what is expected of each party if there is more than one service provider and one end user, avoiding duplication or errors between several agreements.

How to write it

The drafting of an SLA or service level agreement has a specific process:

• Determine customer needs.
• Define the objectives of the service.
• Establish the key concepts.
• Specify the metrics and the evaluation system.
• Establish coordination and periodic reviews.
• Attend to legal certainty.

In summary, an SLA or service level agreement should be a protection mechanism for the parties involved, both to guarantee compliance with the service paid for and to limit the non-contractual demands that the client may have.