Vodafone has introduced global service level agreements (SLAs) for its managed mobility services including voice and data. The goal is to offer large enterprises better transparency and predictability, according to IDG News Service.
The new SLAs include guarantees of how fast Vodafone will despatch SIM cards and mobile phones (two and three days, respectively) and respond to incidents such as a BlackBerry server crashing, said Mark Street, spokesman at Vodafone Group. Customers will also get a monthly SLA performance report, Street said.
The offer will be offered to its Global Enterprise customers at no extra cost and will at first be available in 15 countries, including the US (via Vodafone's JV there, Verizon Wireless), the UK, France, Germany, Italy and Spain.
Vodafone will also offer extras for a fee, including coverage in additional countries, better service levels and a centralised interface for billing inquiry and resolution.
Vodafone didn't provide details about what will happen if the SLAs aren't met. It will send customers the report, and then discuss the results with the customer, according to Street.
The surprise is that it has taken so long to take such a basic step: it's hard to think of any other area of critical telecoms provision to corporations that hasn't covered by SLAs for years.
Vodafone didn't provide any information about what happens if it fails to live up to its self-imposed SLAs - and such details will be the real measure of how serious it is.