Business-hours SLA: why the clock needs to pause
A deadline that counts nights, holidays and time waiting for the customer does not measure your team. See the rules that make your SLA meaningful.
Gerivia Team · · 2 min read
An “8-hour resolution” SLA seems simple until the first ticket arrives at 5:50 pm on Friday. If the clock keeps running, the ticket is due early Saturday morning — and the dashboard marks the team as late on a day they were not working. After a few weeks, nobody looks at the dashboard anymore.
A useful SLA measures the time when your team could take action. In practice, that means four rules.
1. The clock runs only during business hours
Deadlines count only within configured business hours — for example, Monday to Friday, 8 am to 6 pm. A ticket opened Friday at 5:50 pm with an 8-business-hour deadline is due Monday afternoon, not Saturday.
If teams have different schedules (support works Saturdays, finance does not), each SLA policy uses its team's calendar.
2. Holidays do not count
Enable national holidays with a calendar option; add state, municipal and company dates yourself. A deadline crossing a holiday moves back a day, as it should.
3. “Waiting for customer” pauses resolution
When the team asks a question and needs the customer's reply, the ticket moves to waiting for customer — and the resolution clock stops. It resumes when the customer replies. Without this pause, the team is penalized for delays outside its control.
First response is different: it measures how long the customer waited for the initial contact, so it does not pause.
4. Changing priority does not reset elapsed time
A ticket upgraded from “normal” to “urgent” gets a shorter deadline, but elapsed time still counts. Otherwise, changing priority would be enough to “meet” any SLA.
What to measure
With these rules, two metrics become meaningful:
- % of first responses on time — did the customer receive help on time?
- % of resolutions on time — was the issue resolved on time, excluding delays outside the team's control?
Track both by team and priority, alongside satisfaction (CSAT): meeting a deadline with an unhappy customer suggests the ticket was closed too soon.
Gerivia includes these rules: SLA policies by priority, team and type; policy calendars with holidays; pauses while waiting for the customer; and reports you can export to spreadsheets.