At Akumina, every web project is mission critical to your success. Our goal is to provide our Subscribers with consistent industry-leading support services by ensuring that the proper elements and commitments are in place. When you need assistance, our Support Technicians are prepared to work with you to perform the initial research, collecting diagnostic information, recreating the incident and providing workarounds or existing fixes. They will also act as the focal point for communication through the life cycle of an incident. Akumina offers both Standard and Premium technical support, and a particular Subscriber's support level is based on the license selected by the Subscriber.
Standard Technical Support
Standard technical support is included for all Subscriber’s purchasing the Standard License level of the Akumina platform.
Standard technical support operates throughout the year during the hours of 8:30AM to 5:30PM EST, Monday through Friday except for the following stated holidays:
Holiday | Date |
New Year’s Day | January 1st |
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day | typically observed the 3rd Monday of January |
United States Presidents’ Day | typically observed the 3rd Monday of February |
United States Memorial Day | the last Monday of May |
United States Independence Day | July 4th and typically either the 3rd or the 5th of July |
United States Labor Day | the first Monday in September |
United States Columbus Day | typically observed the 2nd Monday in October |
United States Thanksgiving Day | the last Thursday in November |
Day after United States Thanksgiving | |
Christmas Eve | December 24th |
Christmas Day | December 25th |
New Year's Eve | December 31st |
Target Response Times
The chart below shows the priorities that may be set for an Incident created by the Subscriber. It also shows the targeted response times based on the priority. Details on each section are provided below.
Akumina has the right to reprioritize the Priority of a ticket based on the standard examples outlined in the Priority section.
Priority | Target Response Time |
P1 (Urgent/Critical) | 2 Hours within operating hours |
P2 (High/Major) | 4 Hours within operating hours |
P3 (Normal/Low/Minor) | 1 business day |
Premium Technical Support
Premium technical support is included for all Subscriber’s purchasing the Premium License level of the Akumina platform and operates 24 Hours per day, 7 days per week, 365 days per year.
Target Response Times
The chart below shows the different priorities that can be set for an Incident created by the Subscriber. It also shows the targeted response times based on the priority. Details on each section are provided below.
Akumina has the right to reprioritize the Priority of a ticket based on the standard examples outlined in the Priority section.
Priority | Target Response Time |
P1 (Urgent/Critical) | 30 minutes |
P2 (High/Major) | 8 hours |
P3 (Normal/Low/Minor) | 1 business day |
Priority Definitions
P1 (Critical/Urgent): Subscriber’s business is adversely impacted because of Akumina’s software. Examples include:
- Site Down
- Security incident with critical impact
- Data Corruption or Loss
- Critical Akumina Software Component not functioning
- Deployment issues that prevent mission-critical content from being published
P2 (Major/High): Operational performance is affected because of Akumina’s software. Examples include:
- Non-critical Akumina Software Component not functioning
- Akumina Product Update/Upgrade Issues
- Degraded Site performance from normal operation
P3 (Normal/Low/Minor): Impaired operational performance or request for information or assistance with little to no business impact to Subscriber. Examples include:
- Loss of functionality that does not impact the production environment
- Akumina development questions
- General implementation and software usage questions
Response Time Definition
Response Time is the time from when the Subscriber makes the initial request for support to the time that an Akumina Support Technician responds to the Subscriber and begins working on the request. Response Times are dependent on the Priority of the issue.
Response Times are relevant for requests received during Standard Hours of Service. Any support requests made outside of Standard Hours of Service will be responded to per their Priority upon the start of the next business day.
Under the Premium Technical Support Model, the Target Response Time is the time from when the issue is reported to when a meaningful response is provided, with accompanying action items for anyone involved in assisting, be they Akumina employees, partners, or our Subscribers. Emphasis is placed on providing the Subscriber relief to the immediate issue and resumption of normal working operation.
Permanent solutions requiring software changes will be delivered as part of the next product release unless an extenuating circumstance exists where the resulting issue is a P1 (Critical/Urgent). Resolution times will always vary per the complexity or severity of the issue.
It is expected that the Subscriber will cooperate in the resolution of the issue and provide appropriate resources, access, diagnostic information and/or data needed to assist in the troubleshooting and resolution effort. Delays in providing such necessary information may adversely impact resolution. Akumina shall use best commercially reasonable efforts to resolve problems.
Support Process Flow
Customers may submit new Support tickets via the online portal, located at https://support.akumina.com, or via email at support@akumina.com. Submitting a ticket online is the preferred method, as your organization will be able to see and manage multiple issues concurrently on the same page. In addition, when submitting a critical ticket via email, customers must use keywords in the Subject to trigger a response (“critical” or “urgent”).
Upon receipt of a new support request, the request will be assigned a case number in Akumina’s incident ticket tracking system. This case number should be used as a reference with all correspondence with Support. All incoming support cases are reviewed and assigned to an appropriate available Tier 1 Support Technician per Priority. Initial response by the assigned Support Technician may involve clarifying questions, requests for more detail and/or diagnostic information or coordination for a call or online troubleshooting session.
In order to streamline this process, we ask all Subscribers submitting Support tickets to always provide explicitly defined steps to reproduce the current issue when submitting a ticket. If the incident cannot be resolved on the initial contact, Support will collaborate with internal resources to complete in-depth research to further define and troubleshoot the issue.
Product Defects: Should a support case be identified as a product defect, then it will be appropriately logged with the appropriate internal team with a formal request for a permanent software fix, appropriate to the Priority of the issue requested.
Ongoing Communications: While an issue is being researched, our goal is to provide Subscribers with a status update on the issue every business day. However, if we request additional information from the Subscriber, we will place the ticket in a "Pending" state, awaiting a response from the Subscriber. Incidents that are “Pending” will be monitored for up to three business days before we send a second request. After three requests for information from the Subscriber with no response, the incident will be “Solved” and communicated to the Subscriber, who can always open a new issue, referencing the prior ticket. If the Subscriber wishes to continue to engage the support team
Escalation Process
If the Subscriber is not comfortable with the progress on an issue, if service is not satisfactory, or if the Subscriber needs further escalation in regard to a concern over how their case is being handled by Akumina Support, they can contact the individuals below by phone or email.
Escalation Level | Contact |
Level 1 | Support Manager: Lora Griffin |
Level 2 | Vice President of Customer Success: Andy Frades |
Level 3 | CEO: Ed Rogers |
Escalation for Product Defects
Product defects are escalated to the Product Development team based on the Priority of that defect for appropriate remediation. Support Management can also be called upon to assist in the coordination of permanent software fixes based on the Subscriber’s business impact.
Escalation for Hosting
If Akumina is providing managed hosting services of the customers Management Framework (AppManager and ServiceHub) environment (production or otherwise), they will do so in an environment setup on Microsoft’s Azure IAAS (Infrastructure-as-a-Service) cloud. The SLA provided by Microsoft to Akumina will be passed through to our customers in full. Microsoft’s Azure Virtual Machine can be found here: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/support/legal/sla/
Support Coverage
The following items are not covered by an Akumina Support contract:
SharePoint Administration
Support may offer guidance and limited assistance with what's required for Akumina software to work as needed, but support will not include extensive SharePoint administration training and assistance. Client should be responsible for managing and maintaining client-side SharePoint administration.
Training
Support may offer guidance and assistance with proper use of Akumina software and components (App Manager, Widgets, Page Builder, etc.) as well as assist in troubleshooting issues. If repeated issues with similar root causes related to improper use and/or lack of product training, we may recommend additional training.
Customization
Product customizations are provided as a billable service. These will be clearly identified, communicated and directed to our Services team to discuss and manage.
Feature Requests
Product feature requests will be evaluated by Akumina to determine if they will be productized. If a feature request is determined to be added to the Akumina platform, it will be handled by our Product team who will provide updates on features in future product releases. If a feature request is determined to not be added to the Akumina platform, you may have the option to pay for this customization through the Services team.
Feature License Key Requests
Feature license key requests (for new and renewal) should be handled through your Akumina account manager.