We are looking at putting in contract language surrounding Service Level Agreements and I would like to know what people are doing from the standpoint of latency, packet loss, and bandwidth delivery capability. What examples do people have written in contracts on the above, and what penalties are there for not resolving problems? Example: Service Provider agrees to provide maximum latency guarantees 1) on-net CPE to on-net CPE 60 msec. 2) on-net CPE to off-net peering point 30 msec. 3) End to End 100 msec within the continental US. Remedies for violation of latency guarantee for unresolved latency problems. 1 month 15% off of monthly rate 2 month 25% off of monthly rate 3 month 35% off of monthly rate >3 month customer has option of cancelling remainder of contract. My understanding is that expected latency should be based upon the speed of light in glass 0.6C or roughly 6msec per 1000 fiber route miles plus some amount for router serialization and queuing delays (~5 msec/hop?). What do people use as standard rule of thumb for calculating latency? What do people expect for service level commitments, normal+50% (100?) ? Tim Peiffer peiffer@nts.umn.edu Operations Manager - Engineering Automation Networking and Telecommunications Operations University of Minnesota +1 612 626 7884 desk 2218 University Ave +1 612 625 0006 problems +1 612 626 1002 fax Minneapolis MN 55455, USA