1. General
1.1. This is Our Service Level Agreement for Blue Ring Digital Services Ltd, a company registered in England (company number 12709437) with a registered office at 186 Wetmore Road, Burton-on-Trent, Staffordshire, DE14 1QZ in relation to the websites and services provided at blue-ring.co.uk.
1.2. This document is only applicable to customers and users and not employees of Blue Ring Digital Services Ltd.
1.3. "Service Level Agreement", "SLA" refers to this Service Level Agreement.
1.4. "You", "Your" refers to You the customer, user or employee of Blue Ring Digital Services Ltd.
1.5. "We", "Us", "Our", "Blue Ring Digital Services Ltd" refers to Blue Ring Digital Services Ltd .
1.6. "Our Website" refers to Our Website (blue-ring.co.uk).
1.7. "Software" refers to Our web application provided at blue-ring.co.uk.
1.8. "Our Services" refers to any product or service provided by Us to You.
1.9. "Our Design Service" refers to any design works undertaken by Us (i.e. Web Application development, Website Creation etc.).
1.10. We will try to keep everything in this document as straightforward as possible, but if there’s anything You don’t understand, please get in touch with Us.
1.11. The headings in this Service Level Agreement are for convenience only and shall not affect their interpretation.The masculine shall include the feminine and the neuter and the singular the plural and vice versa.
1.12. If any provision or part of any provision of this Service Level Agreement is found by a court or other competent authority to be void or unenforceable, such provision or part of a provision shall be deleted from these Service Level Agreement and the remaining provisions or parts of the provision shall continue to be in full force and effect.
1.13. This SLA supplements Our Terms of Service.
2. Separate SLA's
2.1. This document details Our standard SLA, however You may have been issued a separate SLA for all or part of Our Services. If a separate SLA has been agreed with You this can be found in Your account.
3. Network and Server Uptime 99.5%
3.1. Blue Ring Digital Services Ltd undertakes to make commercially reasonable efforts to ensure that Our Website, Software and Our Services are available to a level of at least 99.5 per cent on a monthly average. If We do not fulfill this obligation (relating to Our Services and Software only), You are entitled to receive a credit note as detailed below.
3.2. Our Website, Software and Our Services are considered unavailable if You receive an “Internal Server Error” or “Service Unavailable” server error message.
3.3. The availability of Our Services and Software is determined across all of Our Services and Software provided to You within a monthly billing period. Availability is calculated as 100 percent, less the arithmetic mean of the error rates. The error rate is the ratio of server errors to the total number of requests within a five-minute period. If no request is made, the error rate for the period in question is zero percent.
3.4. The credit note is calculated as a percentage of all payments made for Our Services and Software during the billing month in which the availability was not provided.
3.5. If the agreed minimum availability of Our Services and Software is not provided, You are entitled to receive a credit note for the sum shown in the following table:-
| Average Availability less than | Credit note for one month's billing |
|---|---|
| 99.50% | 5% |
99.00% | 10% |
| 90.00% | 100% |
4. Maintenance work
4.1. We may temporarily suspend or restrict access to the Our Website, Our Services and Software if this is required for the security of network operation, the maintenance of network integrity (in particular the prevention of serious network disruptions), the interoperability of services and data protection requirements. As far as possible, We will perform required maintenance work during periods of low use.
4.2. Within each quarter, maintenance work causing the service to become unavailable shall not exceed a period of six (6) hours. We will inform You about upcoming maintenance work two (2) working days in advance. In the event of a lengthy temporary suspension of or restrictions to the service, We will notify You seven (7) days in advance of the nature, extent and duration of the down time, as far as circumstances allow and as long as the notification would not delay the elimination of any interruptions that have already occurred. The above limitations are not considered to be periods of unavailability.
5. Response, Resolution & Completion Timeframes
5.1. Enquiries are dealt with on a first-come, first-served "best effort" basis. The tables below details how certain enquiries are dealt with and the expected response timeframes:-
Type | During core times (Monday - Friday 9am - 5pm) | Response |
|---|---|---|
| We aim to respond to emails within 1 hour of receipt. | < 1 hour | |
| Telephone | We aim to answer telephone calls within 5 minutes, if this is not possible calls are diverted to a voice mail system where messages are returned within 1 hour. | < 1 hour |
| Social Media | We aim to respond to managed social media enquiries within in 4 hours. | < 4 hours |
Type | Outside core times | Response |
|---|---|---|
| We aim to respond to emails within 8 hour of receipt. | < 8 hour | |
| Telephone | We aim to answer telephone calls within 15 minutes, if this is not possible calls are diverted to a voice mail system where messages are returned within 8 hour. | < 8 hour |
| Social Media | Managed social media enquiries are generally monitored during core hours only, response may not be received outside of core hours. | N/A |
5.2. support Request
5.2.1. Support requests are provided on a priority first-come, first-served "best effort" basis. When contacting Us using a method above Your request will be assigned a priority as detailed below, where We aim to resolve Your request within the resolution time detailed:-
Priority | Example | Resolution |
|---|---|---|
| Emergency | Complete loss of Our Website, Our Services and/ or Software. | < 4 hours |
| High | The issue is critical preventing business a usual, however no complete operational failure experienced. | < 8 hours |
| Medium | Operational efficiency is degraded, but there is either a reasonable workaround or the majority of Our Services and Software are unimpeded. | < 3 business days |
| Low | There’s an easy and effective workaround, so this is more an irritation than a stoppage. | < 7 business days |
5.2.2. Where We fail to meet the Resolution timeframes above, You will be entitled to receive a credit note for 20% of amount billed for the affected service for the billing period impacted.
5.3. Task Request
5.3.1. The table below lists types of task requests We commonly receive, along with Our aim for completion. The timeframes below are in reference to when We have received all of the information We require, including Your approval to proceed. Timeframes below are provided as examples for the typical tasks We receive within each category. Timeframes can vary based on the complexity, and other factors may affect time needed on a request:-
Task | Details | Completion |
|---|---|---|
| Domain Registration/ Amendment | New registrations and amendments to DNS settings. | < 72 hours |
| Email Account Creation/ Amendment | Creating or amending an email account for a domain managed by Us. | < 24 hours |
| New Basic Website Development | A basic website with less than 10 pages, including a contact form and social media integration. Built and managed on Our proprietary platform. | < 3 business days |
| New Ecommerce Website Development | An ecommerce website with less than 10 standard pages and 30 products. Includes 1 payment module, 3 shipping modules and social media integration. Built and managed on Our proprietary platform. | < 7 business days |
| Basic Amendment to a Website | Basic amendments to website text and images. Including adding new pages, products and services. This applies to websites developed and managed by Us. | < 24 hours |
| Advanced Amendment to a Website | Advanced amendments include changes to the look, style and/ or functionality. | < 7 business days |
| Development of/ or Amendment to a Custom Web Application | Custom web applications can have varying degrees of complexity and functionality. Built and managed on Our proprietary platform. | To be advised once full requirements known |
5.3.2. Where We fail to meet the Completion timeframes above, You will be entitled to receive a credit note for 10% of the amount billed for the affected service for the billing period impacted.
6. Credit Notes For Failed SLA's
6.1. Credit notes shall only be made against future payments, which are due to be paid by You. We will not reimburse the sum in any other form. We will not be responsible for the reimbursement of indirect and consequential damage such as loss of profits, interruption of business, loss of data and information etc. in accordance with Our Terms of Service.
7. Disclaimer
7.1. Unforeseeable, unavoidable events, which are beyond Our control, and events beyond Our liability such as force majeure, war, natural disasters or labor disputes, shall release Us from Our obligation to provide Our Website, Our Services and Software for their duration. Our SLA's are extended by the duration of the disruption; You shall be informed of the occurrence of the disruption in an appropriate manner. If the end of the disruption is not foreseeable or lasts more than one month, each party is entitled to terminate the contract.
7.2. A disruption does not need to be dealt with by Us if the data transmission is disturbed outside the data network operated by Us, e.g. due to line failure or interference with other providers or telecommunication providers. Furthermore, periods shall not be considered times of unavailability during which We restrict or block access to individual products and / or services due to an urgent threat to its data, hardware and / or Software infrastructure or Your data, hardware and / or Software infrastructure caused by external threats (e.g. viruses, trojans), or due to a significant threat to network security or network integrity.
7.3. When making a decision of this nature, We will, as far as possible, take into consideration Your legitimate interests, inform You immediately of the measures taken and take every reasonable action to immediately lift the access restriction or blocking.
7.4. Our responsibility for the components used to provide Our Website, Our Services and Software ends at the data interfaces between the data center and the public data networks or Your data network, if there is a direct connection to the latter's data network based on a contractual agreement.
7.5. We shall only be liable for non-compliance with this SLA if We are solely responsible for such non-compliance. Furthermore, the obligations taken on in this SLA do not apply to the following types of disruption:
7.5.1. Outages caused by incoming / outgoing hacker attacks;
- 7.5.2. Failure to comply with the SLA caused by You or Your Software;
- 7.5.3. Software / programs which have been defectively installed or improperly used by You;
- 7.5.4. Scheduled maintenance performed by Us or Our suppliers, of which You were informed within the minimum notice period;
- 7.5.5. Errors caused by the manufacturer in the standard Software used, on which Our infrastructure is based (e.g. Linux server) and/or hardware;
- 7.5.6. Emergency maintenance;
- 7.5.7. Errors caused by Your amendment to Content or configuration settings;
- 7.5.8. Force majeure
7.6. If We can prove to You that disruptions are not covered by the warranty, We reserves the right to charge You for troubleshooting.
8. Changes to Our Service Level Agreement
8.1. This Service Level Agreement replaces all previous versions. We reserve the right to change this Service Level Agreement at any time.