Severity definitions

Scope of severity definitions

Understanding and accurately assigning severity levels to Support tickets is crucial for effectively supporting our customers. It directly impacts how quickly an issue is addressed, the resources allocated, and ultimately, business operations and user satisfaction.

Properly defined severities ensure critical issues get immediate attention, while less impactful problems are prioritized appropriately.

Severity 1: Urgent - Production down issue

This level is the highest severity and is reserved for problems that are directly impacting business operations (production system), causing significant disruptions, or posing a security risk.

Purpose: Ensure the system is restored to a level which does not impact the business as outlined in the definition. The root cause analysis of an "Urgent" issue is not in the scope of this severity and can be provided during normal customer business hours after the service is restored.

The first response can include: Typical examples for this severity are:

  • Verification of the business impact to understand the nature of the problem

  • What workarounds have been tried?

  • Recommendation to restore/roll back the latest changes

  • What has changed/brought on this situation?

  • System outage:

    • The entire system is down or inaccessible

    • Live applications are unavailable

  • Data loss or corruption: Critical data has been lost or corrupted.

  • Security breach: Unauthorized access to sensitive data or systems

  • Major software failure: The software is not functioning as intended and cannot be used.

Severity 2: High - Production issue

This level is the second-highest severity and is reserved for problems impacting the production environment, resulting in a lack of software functionality and materially degrades significant aspects of the business operation.

Purpose: Make Neptune aware of an issue with the software in your production system which needs attention, but has a moderate impact on the business.

The first response can include: Typical examples for this severity are:

  • Initial investigation: Briefly describe any initial steps taken to understand the problem.

  • Confirm the receipt of the ticket and outline the planned course of action to address the issue.

  • Request additional information, log files, versions of software used, etc.

  • Verify the criticality of the issue.

  • Performance degradation: Slow response times or system performance issues.

  • Minor bugs or errors: Issues that do not prevent the software from functioning but are annoying or inconvenient

  • Issue might affect a subset of users or has limited impact on business processes.

  • The issue does not directly affect core system functionality

  • If unresolved, this issue could get escalated to a higher severity.

Severity 3: Medium - Minor issue

This level is the third-highest severity and is reserved for problems impacting the production environment, resulting in impairment of performance of the software but does not substantially affect any aspects of the business operation.

Purpose: Make Neptune aware of an issue with the software in your production system which needs attention, but has no significant impact on the business.

The first response can include: Typical examples for this severity are:

  • Initial investigation: Briefly describe any initial steps taken to understand the problem.

  • Confirm the receipt of the ticket and outline the planned course of action to address the issue.

  • Request additional information, log files, versions of software used, etc.

  • Verify the criticality of the issue.

  • Minor bugs or glitches: Issues that do not affect the core functionality of the software.

  • Cosmetic issues: Problems with the user interface or appearance of the software.

  • Documentation errors: Inaccuracies or omissions in the software documentation.

  • Feature requests: Requests for new features or enhancements that are not essential but would improve the user experience.

Severity 4: Low - Low-impact issue

This level is the lowest severity and is reserved for problems which can be addressed at a later time without causing significant disruption on production or non-production environments.

Purpose: Make Neptune aware of an issue with the software in your non-production environment or issue which does not have any impact on your production environment.

The first response can include: Typical examples for this severity are:

  • Acknowledgement of the ticket received.

  • Indicate that the issue has been classified as low severity.

  • Explanation on next steps and expected times for responses.

  • Cosmetic issues: Problems with the user interface or appearance of the software.

  • Documentation errors: Inaccuracies or omissions in the software documentation.

  • Feature requests: Requests for new features or enhancements.

Next steps