SLA

Introduction

This Service Level Agreement (“SLA”) governs the services (“Services”) provided under the Master Services Agreement (“MSA”) and applicable Customer Order Form (collectively, the “Agreement”), agreed to by each user of the Services (“Customer”) and DartPoints Operating Company, LLC (“DartPoints”). DartPoints may supplement or amend this SLA without notice, with such changes being effective upon their posting to www.dartpoints.com/SLA. The following SLA is only applicable to those services originating within the data center and do not apply to any additional or external services that Customers may receive.

 

Availability Guarantees

Services will be measured on the basis of the following service level objectives (“SLA Objectives”): DartPoints-owned hardware, DartPoints’ data center network, backbone network, and power availability (“Availability”), change notification and implementation, mean time to repair (“MTTR”) and incident notification. This SLA does not apply to third party network components or services resold or otherwise provided by DartPoints. Any service levels and associated service credits applicable to the Services that are provided by third-party providers will be passed through to Customer by DartPoints.

This SLA provides for 24 hours per day, 7 days per week coverage of the SLA Objectives as follows:

 

Methodology

Availability. The SLA Objectives for Availability are as follows:

Availability Objectives SLA
Site Availability 99.95%
Network Availability 99.999%

 

Availability will be measured from the time a Critical or Major trouble ticket is opened by Customer and confirmed by the DartPoints Network Operations Center (NOC), to the time network access is restored, based on the average of actual minutes of site, network or power availability as a percentage of the corresponding total available network minutes for the month in which the non‐conformance occurs, and will be calculated as follows:

Availability = ((Calendar Month Minutes ‐ Excluded Minutes ‐ Outage Minutes)/ (Calendar Month Minutes ‐ Excluded Minutes)) x 100.

Excluded Minutes include:

  1. Time spent waiting for Customer to respond to DartPoints support personnel during repair period.
  2. Time spent waiting for Customer, Third Party Hardware/Software Vendor’s support teams, or Third Party technical support contracted by the Customer to make necessary repairs, patches, or software update.
  3. Time spent waiting to access Customer premise or cabinet due to access control procedures set by Customer.
  4. Time spent waiting for Customer to confirm efficacy of repair work conducted by DartPoints support personnel.

The equipment and cabling used by Customer must meet any specifications provided by DartPoints, shall be capable of using dual power sources and must not be allowed to exceed the power rating identified by the manufacturer.

Application or performance issues stemming from latency or other network issues which require an increase in contracted bandwidth will not be considered SLA violations so long as DartPoints can confirm that customer is receiving a stable communication link at the contracted level of service. Low, Minor, or non-service affecting issues will not be counted against Outage Minutes.

 

Other SLA Objectives. Other SLA Objectives covered under the SLA include: change notification or implementation, mean time to repair (“MTTR”) and incident notification, which will be measured on a commercially reasonable efforts basis as follows:

Other SLA Objectives SLA
Change Notification ‐ 24 hours.

Implementation (logical) ‐ 2 to 5 business days.

  • Other changes are dependent upon equipment availability from the vendor source.
Mean Time to Repair (MTtR) Classification of Repair Item:

  • Low/Information: no timeframe.
  • Minor: 24 hours or less.
  • Major: 8 hours or less.
  • Critical: 4 hours or less.

Definition of Classification: DartPoints shall take notice of severity level of repair from Customer, but will assess and classify the level of repair based on its own assessment. In assessing the level of repair classification, DartPoints will utilize the following categorizations:

  • Low/informational ‐ A notification of information and not a repair item;
  • Minor ‐ A notification of a normal repair item with low impact and/or individual user impact;
  • Major ‐ Service impact of item of at least 50% with little to no workarounds; or
  • Critical ‐ Out of service/potentially revenue impacting for Customer’s business.
Incident Notification Incident Notification target is within 20 minutes.

 

 

Service Credits

If DartPoints does not meet its Availability SLA Objectives for any one (1) month as calculated by the Availability calculation, Customer may apply for a service credit (“Service Credit”) proportional to the Service nonconformance up to the percentage set forth in the table below, multiplied by the base monthly recurring charge, excluding taxes, fees, surcharges and other similar charges, (“MRC”) for the Service elements responsible for the non‐conformance, subject to any limitations and/or exclusions in this SLA, as follows:

Availability Measurement Service Credit
99.95% to 100% No Credit
99% to 99.949% Up to 10% MRC
97% to 98.999% Up to 25% MRC
95% to 96.999% Up to 50% MRC
Less than 95% Up to 100% MRC

 

To be eligible for a Service Credit, Customer must: (i) properly request that DartPoints open a trouble ticket documenting the non‐conformance and (ii) request the Service Credit within thirty (30) days after the trouble ticket is closed by emailing support@dartpoints.com with “Service Credit Request” in the subject field. Each Service Credit request must reference the circuit identifier(s) for the Service element(s) responsible for the non‐ conformance, the associated trouble ticket number(s) and include any corroborating data or information.

Service Credit requests will be evaluated in relation to the respective accumulated Availability statistics for the month during which the non‐conforming event is alleged to have occurred. Service Credit requests that encompass multiple months will be prorated in accordance with the relevant statistical accumulations for each month. DartPoints shall have thirty (30) business days from the end of the month in which the request is submitted to respond to Customer. Service Credit requests approved by DartPoints will be credited to Customer’s DartPoints account during the billing cycle beginning not less than ten (10) business days after approval.

 

Service Credit Limitations and Exclusions

Service Credit requests will not be accepted for open trouble tickets. Customer may not receive more than one Service Credit per month for any SLA Objective non‐conformance involving a particular circuit element. Multiple instances of nonconformance for the same circuit element during a given month will not be eligible for multiple Service Credits, however, if approved, will be applied toward the accumulated monthly statistics for Network Availability. Service Credits will not be available if Customer fails to request a trouble ticket or for Service terminated by Customer. Service Credits will be Customer’s exclusive remedy for any Service non‐conformance or defect and under no circumstances will Customer be entitled to any refund or other payment for a violation of this SLA. Service Credits may not be transferred or applied to another account.

Service Credits are not available for scheduled maintenance or upgrades to the DartPoints network or facilities, or planned or unplanned maintenance or upgrades to Customer’s local area network (“LAN”), including, but not limited to, network devices and physical plant equipment (e.g. HVAC and power system) or for any Service non‐conformance or defect caused by or associated with, in whole or in part, the following:

  • Any non‐conformance, failure or delay associated in whole or in part with Customer’s LAN, Customer provided software, equipment, applications, facilities or connectivity or for any beta or trial service;
  • Any act or omission on the part of Customer, others engaged or authorized by Customer or by third parties (including, without limitation, other service providers and utilities) and violations of the DartPoints Acceptable Use Policy (“AUP”);
  • Customer’s failure to release the Service for testing and repair as requested by DartPoints or any failure by Customer, or others authorized by Customer, to provide reasonable access to Customer’s premises that prevents DartPoints from complying with obligations;
  • Any force majeure event or other event beyond the control of DartPoints, including, without limitation, unavailability, interruptions or delays in telecommunications or other third party equipment, supplies, power or services needed to provide the Services, virus attacks and hackers and as otherwise provided in the MSA;
  • New Service that has not been accepted by Customer or any Service non‐conformance occurring within the first thirty (30) days of Service for the affected circuit element;
  • Service that is (i) modified on an individual case basis (“ICB”), (ii) based on classes of service other than Committed Information Rate (“CIR”) or Variable Bit Rate (“VBR”), (iii) where the router or other customer premises equipment (collectively, “CPE”) is not configured to Traffic Shape the packets offered to less than or equal to the Sustained Cell Rate (“SCR”) or CIR, and/or (iv) delivered to the Customer using EVDO/Wireless; and network access that does not directly interface a port on the DartPoints network via physical or logical connection; or
  • Any event or occurrence resulting in a “no trouble found” determination by Customer Support.