SLA (service-level agreement)
Definition
A service-level agreement (SLA) is a commitment to respond to or resolve customer issues within a defined time, tracked by deadline clocks that account for business hours and trigger escalation when breached.
In customer support, an SLA turns “we answer quickly” into a number: first response within four hours, resolution within two business days. The word covers two related things — the promise made to customers, and the internal machinery of deadline clocks, breach detection and escalation that makes the promise keepable.
Why it matters
An SLA without a clock is a slogan. The machinery questions decide whether SLA tracking is real: does the deadline account for business hours (a ticket filed Friday at 5 p.m. should not breach over the weekend), is the breach timestamp actually recorded, and does a breach trigger something — or just turn a label red? Support teams also live with SLA tiers: a high-priority ticket carries a shorter deadline than a routine one, so rules must match on priority.
How SLAs work in Oneop
Oneop’s SLA rules are real clocks. Creating a ticket stamps a breach deadline and due date from the newest active rule matching its priority. The first public agent reply stamps first-response time; resolving stamps time-to-resolution. Nothing is inferred after the fact — the timestamps are written when the events happen.
Deadlines are computed in business minutes, not wall-clock minutes. The default calendar is Monday–Friday, 09:00–17:00 UTC, and each workspace edits its own working days, daily window, timezone offset and holiday list from a settings page. A ticket created outside working hours starts its clock when the next working window opens.
Escalation is automatic and idempotent. A recurring sweep finds breached tickets and moves each up an escalation ladder — raising the escalation level, flipping status to escalated, optionally reassigning to the rule’s manager, and firing a notification — and it will never double-escalate the same breach. Escalation can also feed support automation rules that fire on SLA breach.
Two honest boundaries: the SLA clock does not pause while a ticket waits on a customer reply, and there is no separate first-response target distinct from the rule’s deadline. SLA management is available on Pro plans and above.
Related terms: CSAT, live chat handoff. Product page: Help desk.
Related terms
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