Service Level Agreement
The University of Texas at Austin
Effective Date: 1/1/2009
Score
Overview
The University Group E-Mail System enables authorized users to send e-mail messages to predefined groups at The University of Texas at Austin. Examples of appropriate use would include a message from Payroll telling employees how to claim their W-2 form or a message from a faculty member informing students about an assignment. The system is not intended for casual correspondence and should be used only when the e-mail content impacts a significant percentage of recipients. Additional information can be found on the Group E-mail System help page.
Review Process
This document defines the practices that Information Technology Services (ITS) will use for the Group E-Mail System service. The details of this document may be reviewed and amended as required, or at least annually, to accurately reflect business and service needs.
Time Conventions
Unless otherwise indicated, business hours are from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, excluding holidays and reduced schedule days.
Scope
The following user communities at the university are the intended recipients for the Group E-Mail System service: Faculty, Staff.
Service Criticality
This service has been identified as Critical, based on the ITS Critical Services Assessment Criteria. Please refer to the Critical Services Assessment Criteria for more information on the assessment methodology.
Service Description
University Group E-Mail System features include:
- An authorization procedure by which designated Group Contacts review messages prior to sending. (NOTE: This does not apply to messages sent to Special Groups).
- Real-time generation of recipient lists.
- Individual delivery of messages to recipients, eliminating the ability of recipients to view or reply to the entire list.
- Delivery via the university's centralized bulk mail server, relieving traffic on departmental mail servers.
- A PGP certification key stamp that permits recipients to verify the authenticity of the message.
- A wizard-style submission interface that walks users through each step of the process of sending a Group E-Mail message.
Supported Computing Environment
The University Group E-Mail System is a Natural/webAgent interface to the university's Bulk Mail Distribution System. The webAgent Web interface allows users to submit proposed messages, request authorization, and request delivery to specific predefined or custom recipient lists. Natural processes prepare the recipient list and pass it to UMBS via FTP. The user submits their message via their personal e-mail client with the unique recipient address and UMBS matches that address to the received list and distributes the message accordingly.
For the latest information on tested systems and a complete list of supported procedures, refer to the application Web site: https://utdirect.utexas.edu/gs/oe/help.WBX.
Technical Support
End users always start with Tier 1, which is basic support. Tier 2 is the second support level and is reserved for more complex issues. Departmental desktop support staff and the ITS Help Desk may escalate issues to Tier 2.
Tier 1 Support
While limited Tier 1 support of the Web submission interface is provided by the ITS Help Desk, Tier 1 support for authorizations, delivery problems and other issues is provided by the ITS Applications Group E-mail stewards. Requests for Tier 1 support will receive a response within one business day.
Tier 2 Support
Tier 2 technical support is provided by the ITS Applications Group E-mail stewards. Examples of Tier 2 support issues include handling of programmatic errors and investigation into the disposition of submitted mail messages. Requests for Tier 2 support will receive a response within one business day, although solutions will often take longer based on the complexity of the problem involved.
Special Support
For problems with mail delivery at the UMBS level (bulk mail and FTP client), support is provided by the ITS Systems Unix group. Support for recipient lists/datasets is provided by the appropriate university department (for example, HRS, SIS, Provost, etc.). Requests for support from these groups will be submitted by the ITS Applications Group E-mail stewards and may extend the time required to reach a solution.
Service Performance
The Group E-Mail System makes use of shared network and computer resources and relies on the involvement of users and administrators. Message delivery times vary accordingly.
Execution Time
Under normal computing conditions, most Group E-Mail recipient lists are generated in under 5 minutes and messages are delivered at the maximum rate of 20 per second. User and/or administrator involvement in the authorization, list generation, and message sending processes may delay automated delivery, so that delivery times greater than 24 hours may occasionally occur. Under optimal conditions, distribution of an e-mail message to all students, faculty, and staff (approx. 70,000 recipients) requires a minimum of 60 minutes after the sending of the e-mail.
Using Group E-Mail for Emergency Notifications
The Group E-Mail System should not be relied upon for urgent notifications or as the only means of notification in an emergency. See the Group E-Mail Performance Expectations page for more information.
Service Availability
This section provides information about the normal schedule of times when the service is available, the times specified for scheduled maintenance, and defines expectations for reporting service problems and changes.
Normal Service Availability
The University Group E-Mail System Web site is designed to be available for customer use 24-hours-per-day, seven days-per-week, 365 days-per-year (24x7x365) excluding scheduled maintenance times.
Schedule Maintenance
Scheduled maintenance for the Group E-Mail System service is essential for upgrades and to maintain security, and may occur nightly after 6 p.m., for outages of less than one hour; or on the third Sunday of the month, for efforts involving outages of more than one hour.
Problem Reporting and Change Notification
ITS will notify customers using the ITS Services Status page of service availability and service delivery issues for the Group E-Mail System. To the maximum extent possible, installation of service, application, and security updates will be performed during scheduled maintenance.
Key Service Indicators
List of Metrics/Measures
ITS Applications will measure the ease of using the system in the following way:
- The actual number of University Group E-Mail messages issued compared to the number of people who push the "Submit" button on the Web site to generate a certificate (University Group E-Mail System issued/Push count for the "Submit" button). The goal is 80%.
The stewards will measure the quality of self-help tools (documentation on the Web) in the following way:
- The number of support requests within a month for University Group E-Mail System compared to the number of messages issued (Support Requests/Number of Messages). The goal is a range of 10-20% of University Group E-Mail System users will need support.
Dependencies
University Group E-mail System depends on the mainframe, the utdirect and bmds servers and on the Apollo and Task Manager applications. Message submission also depends on the user's own e-mail client.
Service Report Card
ITS will publish performance for this service in the public ITS Services Report Card.
Other Party Responsibilities
In addition to the services provided by ITS, subscribers (users) of the service and identified owners/administrators agree to certain important responsibilities. All parties agree to be aware of and adhere to the university's Acceptable Use Policy.
User/Subscriber Responsibilities
Subscribers agree to abide by the policies and procedures described in the Group E-mail System help page.
Departmental IT Support Staff
ITS Applications Group E-mail stewards agree to provide prompt response to custom list requests.
Other Parties
- Recipient list owners are responsible for approval of authorization requests to send to their lists within 24 hours.
- Recipient list owners are responsible for maintaining lists of owners and approved senders for their lists.
Cost of Service
Currently, University Group E-Mail System is funded for the 2008-2009 fiscal year.
