Page 532 - Handbook of Modern Telecommunications

Network Organization and Governance 4-63

4. Optional services: All optional services that the service provider is willing to supply on request
should be listed, in addition to those that are specifically part of the current agreement.
In addition, the conditions, like provisioning and prices, must be detailed. Contracted and
optional services may combined into bundles for pricing purposes.
5. Priorities of customers: In order to provide a SLA with multiple stages, clients are expected to set
priorities for the following items:
• Sites
• Applications
• Users
• User groups
These priorities may differ, particularly in the case of multinational enterprises.
6. Service offer: The service offer must be quantified. This contract item may be synchronized with
contract item 5, where priorities are set for sites, applications, users, and user groups. The highest
service level is 24 × 7 × 365.
7. Metrics for services: All metrics to be considered are grouped in accordance with FCAPS (fault,
configuration, accounting, performance, security). Examples are:
• Fault metrics:
− Number of outages by service
− Availability by service
− Network delay
− Utilization of network and systems components
− Mean Time between Failures (MTBF)
− Mean Time to Incidents (MTTI)
− Mean Time to Repair (MTTR)
− Mean Time between Breakdowns (MTBB) and Mean Time of Diagnosis (MTOD)
− Maximal duration of outages
− Ratio: proactive and reactive problem detection
− Ratio: referred problem and total number of problems
• Performance metrics:
− Utilization of managed objects
− Throughput rates
− Security metrics:
− Number of security violations
8. Definition of outage: Include the exact definition of outages that do not impact the fulfillment of
the SLA. In this category, include preventive maintenance and other client-ordered activities. The
term vis mayor should be defined in writing.
9. Responsibilities of customers: Written confirmation that customers ensure physical access to
managed objects and assist in outage detection and problem resolution. It is expected that secu-
rity measures will be mutually agreed upon.
10. Reporting and reviews: Reports that are defined and created must be supported by the monitor-
ing tools. The frequency of reporting, access to reports, and availability of real-time reporting, as
well periodic reports should be defined. In many cases, Web access to these reports is required by
customers. In order to become more dynamic, actual notifications, reports, and information are
expected to be published on Web servers. Using “push” is a viable option.
11. Modifications: The process for changing the SLA, if necessary, should be defined along with the
persons who are authorized to make changes. Rules are required for differentiating between cor-
rections, rectifications, and changes.
12. Refinements: Technology may require refinement of the SLA and a redefinition of the commit-
ment. For example, new equipment may be added, and the client may therefore have increased