How it works in a data room
The service level agreement names a target, such as 99.9 percent monthly availability, defines what counts as downtime, and lists exclusions like announced maintenance windows. If availability drops below the target, the client can claim a credit, typically a share of that month’s fee. The fine print matters: some agreements measure only the login page, others the full application; some require you to file a claim within days. Strong providers publish a status page with incident history, which tells you more than the headline percentage.
Why it matters in a deal
A percentage point sounds small, but 99 percent allows more than seven hours of outage a month, while 99.9 percent allows about forty-three minutes. During a bid week, either can hurt. Credits rarely compensate for a missed deadline, so the real value of an SLA is as evidence of how seriously the provider runs operations. Read it alongside the disaster recovery commitments. Enterprise agreements, often on quote-based pricing, are where stronger terms usually appear.
Example
A Canadian pension fund’s procurement team compares two providers for its year-round co-investment room. One offers 99.9 percent with credits and a public status page showing two short incidents in a year; the other states 99.5 percent and keeps incident history private. The fund chooses the first, noting the difference in its vendor file. See the pricing guide for how contract length affects terms.