What should be in your IT support contract or SLA?
An IT support SLA is the part of your contract that sets out what your provider promises to do, how quickly it will respond, and what is not covered. A good one is specific about scope, response and resolution, priorities, exclusions, escalation and reporting. Use this page to check any contract, including ours.
What response times does Lanmark commit to?
The targets are written into your agreement, by priority.
| Priority | What it means | Total: first response | Total: onsite | Flex: first response |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| P1 | Global or major system failure, affecting all users | 30 minutes | 4 hours | 1 hour |
| P2 | System failure affecting a lot of users or a department | 30 minutes | 4 hours | 1 hour |
| P3 | Support issue affecting fewer than 5 people | 1 hour | 8 hours | 1 hour |
Onsite response is not part of Flex. Change requests and planned work are scheduled with you.
What should a good SLA cover?
Eight things. Use this as a checklist against any document in front of you, including ours.
- Scope of cover
- Exactly which users, devices, applications, sites and hours are included, and which are not. Vague scope is where most disputes start.
- Response times
- How quickly the provider acknowledges an issue and begins work, set out by priority, not a promise to act as soon as possible.
- Resolution targets
- How quickly issues are expected to be fixed, clearly separate from response. Where a fix time is not realistic, the agreement should say how the issue is handled.
- Priority definitions
- How urgent is separated from routine, with examples, and who decides. Agree the definitions before an incident, not during one.
- Escalation path
- What happens when a target is missed: who is notified, when, and what the next step is. Named roles beat promises of attention.
- Exclusions
- What sits outside the agreement, such as third-party software faults, hardware beyond a certain age, or changes made without the provider’s knowledge.
- Reporting
- How performance is measured, what is reported and how often. If nothing is measured, nothing is promised.
- Review and change
- How the agreement is updated as you grow, add a site or adopt a new system, and how much notice each side gives.
What is the difference between response time and resolution time?
Response time is how quickly somebody acknowledges your problem and starts work on it. Resolution time is how quickly it is actually fixed.
A quick response shows a well-staffed service desk. On its own it says nothing about whether your finance team can run payroll this afternoon. If an agreement commits to a response time and is silent on resolution, your protection is limited to the speed of the first reply.
Not every issue can carry a set fix time. Some depend on a third party, a hardware replacement or a vendor patch. A good agreement commits to resolution targets where they are realistic, explains how the rest are managed, and keeps you updated. Find both numbers in any proposal. If only one exists, ask why.
What is the difference between a contract and an SLA?
The contract is the overall legal agreement: term, fees and how they change, notice periods, liability, confidentiality and data protection. The SLA is normally a schedule inside it that sets the performance standards: how fast the provider responds, how issues are prioritised, what is in and out of scope, and how performance is reported.
A tenancy is a fair analogy. The tenancy sets rent and term, but the repairs clause tells you how quickly the landlord comes when the boiler fails in January. IT contracts fail the same way: tight commercial terms, a thin performance schedule, and nobody notices until something breaks.
When you review a proposal, read the schedule first. If there is no SLA schedule, or it is a paragraph of reassuring adjectives, that is your finding.
What should you ask before you sign?
Put these to every provider you are considering. The pattern of answers tells you more than any brochure.
- How are response and resolution measured?
- A good answer names the measurement system and offers to show you a report.
- What counts as priority one?
- You want examples that fit your business, such as a whole site offline, not an abstract definition.
- What is excluded?
- Every agreement has exclusions. A provider who says there are none has not read their own schedule.
- What happens if a target is missed?
- Look for an escalation route and, where offered, a stated remedy.
- Is 24x7 cover included or charged?
- If your team works evenings or weekends, get the answer in writing.
- Does the price change when something breaks?
- Ask whether call-out, per-device or project-rate charges can arise inside the covered scope.
- How is performance reported?
- Monthly reporting with named measures beats an open invitation to ask any time.
- What security monitoring is standard?
- Managed detection and response, which watches for attacks around the clock and acts on them, is now a baseline expectation.
- What does leaving involve?
- A confident provider describes how they hand over documentation, administrative access and data without drama.
What are the red flags in an IT support contract?
Six things that should slow you down before signature.
- Promises made only in conversation
- If it matters enough to say out loud, it matters enough to write into the schedule.
- Vague language with no target
- Phrases such as reasonable endeavours, prompt attention and rapid response sound like commitments and are not. A target you cannot measure is one nobody can miss.
- Charges per call-out or per device
- When a provider bills per call-out, a busy month is a good month for them. When they bill per device and scope is drawn narrowly, more of your estate can fall outside it. Plenty of good firms use these models, so read the covered scope closely.
- Security monitoring as an optional extra
- If continuous monitoring is a line item you can decline, ask what the service covers without it.
- No definition of urgent
- Without agreed severity definitions, priority becomes a negotiation at the worst moment, when systems are down.
- Terms that make leaving difficult
- Long automatic renewals, short notice windows, charges for handing back your own data, or administrative credentials the provider will not share.
How does Lanmark structure its own contracts?
Judge any contract against the checklist above, including ours. Lanmark Total and Lanmark Core run for 12 months, and Lanmark Flex is prepaid hours with no contract. Lanmark Total is priced per user, so we do not earn more because something broke.
Lanmark Total includes unlimited support Monday to Friday 8am to 6pm, 24x7x365 security monitoring, Microsoft 365 backup and a named senior technician. 24x7 support is available on request.
We publish our own service desk figures, taken from our service desk system: 87% of calls answered in 15 seconds, an 11 minute average response, a 26 minute average resolution, 74% fixed at first contact and 99% customer satisfaction. We are happy to look over any contract you have been offered, whether or not it is ours.
See the plans and pricesWhat do people ask about SLAs?
What is the difference between an IT contract and an SLA?
The contract is the overall legal agreement covering the term, fees, notice periods, liability and data protection. The service level agreement is normally a schedule within it that sets the performance standards, such as response times, priority definitions, exclusions and reporting. The contract governs the commercial relationship, while the SLA governs what you experience when something goes wrong.
What should a good IT support SLA include?
Eight things: the scope of cover, response time commitments by priority, resolution times or targets, clear priority definitions, an escalation path when a target is missed, explicit exclusions, regular performance reporting, and a process for reviewing and changing the agreement. Each should be written into the schedule rather than described in conversation.
What is the difference between response time and resolution time?
Response time is how quickly the provider acknowledges your issue and begins work on it. Resolution time is how quickly the issue is actually fixed. A fast response with no resolution commitment offers limited protection, so a good agreement addresses both and explains how issues that cannot carry a set fix time will be managed.
What counts as an exclusion in an IT support contract?
An exclusion is something the agreement does not cover, so it falls outside the promised response and resolution standards. Common examples include faults in third-party software the provider does not manage, hardware beyond a defined age, and problems caused by changes made without the provider’s knowledge. Ask to see them listed.
What happens if my IT provider misses an SLA target?
That depends on what the agreement says, which is why it is worth checking before you sign. A good contract sets out an escalation path: who is notified, at what point, and what happens next. Some agreements include a remedy such as a service credit, many do not. If the document describes no consequence at all, that tells you something.
Where to go next
Have a contract you are unsure about?
Send it over and we will tell you plainly what it does and does not promise, whether or not it is ours.
Talk to us about your IT support contract