Hosting Service Level Agreement (SLA) Policy
Document ID: WBL-POL-SLA-v1.0 Policy Version: 1.0 Effective Date: [DATE] Applies To: All Webility managed hosting clients Owner: [Technical Director / Operations Lead]
Purpose: This policy defines Webility's hosting service level commitments, measurement methodology, credit calculation, support response tiers, and maintenance procedures. It applies to all clients on a Webility Managed Hosting plan and is incorporated by reference into the Hosting Services Agreement (WBL-CTR-HST-[ID]-v1.0).
In the event of conflict between this policy and a client's signed Hosting Services Agreement, the signed Agreement governs.
1. Uptime Commitments
1.1 Uptime Guarantees by Plan
| Plan | Monthly Uptime Guarantee | Permitted Downtime/Month |
|---|---|---|
| Starter | 99.5% | ≤ ~3.65 hours |
| Professional | 99.9% | ≤ ~43.8 minutes |
| Business | 99.95% | ≤ ~21.9 minutes |
| Enterprise | 99.99% | ≤ ~4.4 minutes |
1.2 Uptime Definition
"Uptime" means the percentage of time in a calendar month during which the client's hosted website or application is accessible and returning a successful HTTP response (2xx or 3xx status) from the primary server infrastructure.
"Downtime" means any period where the service is not accessible and returning a successful response, excluding periods covered by Scheduled Maintenance and SLA Exclusions (Section 1.3).
Measurement: Uptime is measured using Webility's monitoring system, which performs checks at [1-minute] intervals from [X] geographically distributed monitoring locations.
The monitoring system is Webility's authoritative record for SLA calculations. Client-reported downtime observations are taken seriously and investigated, but the final SLA calculation uses monitoring system data.
1.3 SLA Exclusions — What Does NOT Count as Downtime
The following events do not count toward SLA calculations:
| Exclusion Category | Examples |
|---|---|
| Scheduled Maintenance | Planned maintenance within authorized maintenance windows with 48-hour advance notice |
| Emergency Security Patches | Applied immediately without advance notice; notice provided as soon as practicable |
| Force Majeure | Natural disasters, widespread datacenter power failures, major ISP backbone outages, acts of government, pandemic-related infrastructure disruption |
| DDoS Attacks Exceeding Plan Capacity | Volumetric attacks beyond the mitigation capacity of the client's hosting plan tier |
| Client-Caused Issues | Downtime caused by the client's own code, database queries, plugins, themes, configuration changes, or unauthorized server access |
| Third-Party Failures | Failures of third-party CDN providers, DNS registrars (if not managed by Webility), external API providers, payment gateways, email delivery services |
| Client's Domain or DNS | Domain expiry, DNS misconfiguration at the client's registrar, propagation delays after client-authorized DNS changes |
| Non-Payment Suspension | Service suspended per Section 7.3 of the Hosting Services Agreement |
| Legal or Regulatory Action | Suspension ordered by law enforcement, court order, or regulatory authority |
| Actions Requested by Client | Any downtime resulting from a client-authorized maintenance activity or configuration change |
2. SLA Credit Policy
2.1 Credit Entitlement
If the actual uptime for a calendar month falls below the guaranteed uptime for the client's plan, the client is entitled to a service credit:
| Uptime Achieved (for the month) | Credit as % of Monthly Fee |
|---|---|
| Within guarantee − 0.5% (e.g., 99.4–99.5% for Professional plan) | 10% |
| Within guarantee − 1.5% | 20% |
| Within guarantee − 4% | 40% |
| Below guarantee − 4% (i.e., below 95.9% for Professional plan) | 100% |
Example: A Professional plan (99.9% SLA) that achieves 98.5% uptime = 1.4% below guarantee → 20% credit.
2.2 Credit Limits
- Credits are applied as a deduction on the next invoice
- Credits are not refundable as cash
- Total credits in any calendar month are capped at 100% of the monthly hosting fee for that plan
- Credits are the client's sole remedy for SLA breaches — they do not entitle the client to terminate the Agreement or claim consequential damages
2.3 How to Claim a Credit
Credits are not automatically applied. The client must submit a credit request:
- Email: billing@webility.local
- Subject:
SLA Credit Request — [CLIENT NAME] — [MONTH/YEAR] - Include:
- Client name and hosted domain(s)
- Month for which credit is claimed
- Dates and approximate times of observed downtime
- Any monitoring data or screenshots the client has
- Deadline: Credit requests must be submitted within 15 calendar days of the end of the month in which the SLA breach occurred. Late requests will not be honored.
Processing: Webility will verify the request against monitoring system logs within [5] business days and issue a credit confirmation or a written explanation if the credit is not granted.
2.4 Downtime Reporting by Webility
When Webility's monitoring system detects downtime exceeding [15] consecutive minutes:
| Duration | Notification |
|---|---|
| 15 minutes | Automated alert sent to client's designated technical contact |
| 60 minutes | Personal notification from Webility PM or on-call engineer |
| 4 hours (P1) | Escalation per Section 3.1 |
3. Support Response Times
3.1 Priority Classification
| Priority | Definition | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| P1 — Critical | Complete service outage; site is entirely inaccessible to all users | Website returns 502/503/504; database completely unavailable; payment processing broken |
| P2 — High | Significant degradation; major feature unavailable; significant performance impact | E-commerce checkout failing; forms not submitting; >50% of pages returning errors |
| P3 — Medium | Partial degradation; functionality affected but primary service accessible | Slow load times; specific page errors; minor plugin failures |
| P4 — Low | Cosmetic or minor issues; no significant impact on user experience | SSL warning on a non-critical subdomain; minor display inconsistency; informational question |
3.2 Response and Resolution SLAs by Plan
| Plan | P1 Response | P1 Resolution | P2 Response | P2 Resolution | P3 Response | P4 Response |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | 4 hours | Best effort / 24h | 8 business hours | 3 business days | 2 business days | 5 business days |
| Professional | 2 hours | 8 hours | 4 business hours | 2 business days | 1 business day | 3 business days |
| Business | 1 hour | 4 hours | 2 hours | 1 business day | 4 business hours | 2 business days |
| Enterprise | 30 minutes | 2 hours | 1 hour | 4 hours | 2 business hours | 1 business day |
"Response" = First acknowledgement with engineer assigned. "Resolution" = Service restored or workaround implemented. Root cause analysis may follow.
P1 response times apply 24/7 for Business and Enterprise plans; during business hours + on-call for Starter and Professional.
3.3 How to Report an Incident
| Channel | Priority | Contact |
|---|---|---|
| Email: hosting@webility.local | All priorities | Primary channel — creates a ticket automatically |
| Phone: [SUPPORT PHONE] | P1 / P2 only | For immediate response on critical issues |
| Client portal: [PORTAL URL] | All priorities | Track ticket status |
Do not report P1 issues by email only — call the support line for fastest response. Email creates a ticket and is monitored, but a call ensures immediate human response.
Information to include in all reports:
- Hosted domain name
- Nature of the issue
- Error messages seen (screenshot if possible)
- When it started
- Any recent changes (plugin updates, content changes, DNS changes)
4. Scheduled Maintenance
4.1 Maintenance Windows
Webility performs scheduled maintenance during the following windows:
| Day | Time (Agency local time) | Maximum Duration |
|---|---|---|
| Tuesday | 11:00 PM – 2:00 AM | 3 hours |
| Thursday | 11:00 PM – 2:00 AM | 3 hours |
Not all maintenance windows are used every week. Maintenance will only occur within these windows.
4.2 Notification
- Standard notice: 48 hours advance notice by email to the client's designated technical contact
- Emergency maintenance (critical security patches): Applied immediately; notice provided as soon as practicable (typically within 1 hour)
- Major maintenance (platform upgrades, infrastructure migrations): 7 days advance notice where possible
4.3 Maintenance Activities
Scheduled maintenance may include:
- Operating system security patches
- Webserver software updates (Apache, Nginx)
- PHP version updates (with prior confirmation if version changes are required)
- Server infrastructure upgrades
- Backup system maintenance
- SSL certificate renewals
- Security configuration updates
- CDN and firewall rule updates
4.4 Client-Requested Maintenance
Clients may request non-emergency maintenance activities (e.g., PHP version change, server region migration) outside the standard window. These are:
- Scheduled by agreement with the PM
- Subject to a separate maintenance schedule notification
- Not counted against the SLA if properly scheduled and notified
5. Monitoring and Reporting
5.1 Uptime Monitoring
Webility monitors all managed hosting environments using:
| Component | Monitoring Method |
|---|---|
| Website availability | HTTP/HTTPS endpoint check every [1] minute from [X] locations |
| Response time | Measured at each check interval |
| SSL certificate validity | Checked daily; alert at 30 days before expiry |
| Domain expiry | Checked weekly if domain is registered through Webility; alert at 60 days |
| Server resource usage | CPU, memory, disk, bandwidth — thresholds alert at 80% |
| Security events | Log monitoring for failed login attempts and suspicious patterns |
5.2 Client Monitoring Access
Clients on Professional, Business, and Enterprise plans have access to a real-time uptime dashboard:
Dashboard URL: [URL or "via client portal"] Access: Provided at account setup
5.3 Monthly Reporting
| Report | Starter | Professional | Business | Enterprise |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Monthly uptime report | On request | ✓ — emailed by 5th of following month | ✓ | ✓ |
| Security summary | — | — | ✓ | ✓ |
| Performance trends | — | — | ✓ | ✓ |
| Custom reporting | — | — | — | ✓ |
6. Backup and Recovery
6.1 Backup Schedule
| Plan | Backup Frequency | Retention | Storage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | Daily | 30 days | Offsite |
| Professional | Daily | 60 days | Offsite |
| Business | Daily | 90 days | Offsite + geo-redundant |
| Enterprise | Daily + hourly snapshots | 365 days | Geo-redundant |
6.2 Recovery Time Objectives
| Plan | Recovery Time Objective (RTO) | Recovery Point Objective (RPO) |
|---|---|---|
| Starter | Best effort (up to 2 business days) | Up to 24 hours |
| Professional | 1 business day | Up to 24 hours |
| Business | 4 hours | Up to 24 hours (hourly for DB on request) |
| Enterprise | 1 hour | Up to 1 hour |
6.3 Restore Inclusions
| Plan | Included Restores/Month |
|---|---|
| Starter | 1 |
| Professional | 2 |
| Business | Unlimited |
| Enterprise | Unlimited |
Additional restores: [RATE] per restore (all plans).
7. Policy Updates
Webility may update this policy with [30] days' written notice to clients. Continued use of hosting services after the notice period constitutes acceptance. If a client does not accept material changes, they may terminate their Hosting Services Agreement with [30] days' written notice per the cancellation clause of their signed agreement.
Webility — WBL-POL-SLA-v1.0 | Hosting SLA Policy This policy is incorporated by reference into the Hosting Services Agreement (WBL-CTR-HST-v1.0). In the event of conflict, the signed client Agreement governs.