Service Agreements
Security System Service Agreements
Four ways to hold technical support in place after a system is installed. Each one is quoted against your actual system, your site count and the way your operation runs.
How this page works
Every agreement is quoted, not listed
This page describes what each option contains. It does not describe what any of it costs, when it starts, or how quickly anyone arrives.
Security system service agreements are priced against a real system, not a category. Two hospitals with the same platform can carry very different amounts of work depending on door count, controller generation, server topology, camera population, retention policy and how much undocumented change has accumulated since handover. A number published on a web page would be wrong for almost everyone reading it.
So the structure below is fixed and the commercial terms are not. Coverage hours, after-hours availability, response targets, visit counts and included hours are written into the signed agreement for each customer after the system has been reviewed. Where this page shows a placeholder instead of a figure, that is deliberate.
If you already know which structure you want, say so in the request and it will be quoted directly. If you are not sure, a system review comes first and the recommendation follows from what the review finds.
Four agreement structures
From single-incident repair work through to a support plan written around a facility that cannot be allowed to go dark.
Option 1. On-Demand Technical Service
Time-and-material service with no recurring commitment. Suitable for occasional repair or troubleshooting where the volume of work does not justify a standing agreement.
- Billed on time and material. Labour and parts charged against the work actually performed.
- Occasional repair and troubleshooting. Single faults, isolated failures, one-off programming changes.
- Remote or on-site support when available. Scheduling depends on current workload, since no capacity is reserved in advance.
- No recurring agreement. Nothing to renew and nothing to cancel.
- Work is documented the same way. Findings, changes and recommendations are written up whether or not an agreement exists.
Option 2. Preventive Maintenance Agreement
Scheduled inspection and testing so that faults are found on a planned visit rather than during an incident.
- Scheduled system inspections. Controllers, power supplies, batteries, reader loops, servers, storage and workstations reviewed on a set cycle.
- System health checks. Service states, database condition, storage capacity, retention against policy, communication status across the device population.
- Functional testing. Sample door testing, alarm annunciation, monitored input supervision, camera recording and playback verification.
- Configuration and backup review. Confirmation that configuration backups exist, are current and can actually be restored.
- Deficiency reports. Written record of what was found, with condition and location referenced in your own terms.
- Prioritized recommendations. Findings ranked by operational and security impact, not by what is easiest to sell.
- Annual, semi-annual or quarterly scheduling. Frequency set to the size and criticality of the system.
Option 3. Priority Support Agreement
Preventive maintenance plus a standing support relationship for sites where downtime has an operational cost.
- Preventive maintenance included. Everything in Option 2, on the agreed schedule.
- Priority scheduling. Agreement holders are placed ahead of on-demand work in the queue.
- Remote technical assistance. Diagnosis, configuration changes and log review handled remotely where the system permits it.
- Preferred service rates where applicable. Applied to work falling outside the agreement scope.
- Configuration records and service history. Controller inventory, door schedule, server roles and a running record of every change made.
- System health reporting. Periodic written reporting on condition, capacity and open deficiencies.
- Planned upgrade consultation. Firmware, version and hardware end-of-life planning before it becomes urgent.
- Customized response targets. Written into the agreement rather than assumed.
Option 4. Mission-Critical Support Plan
Built for hospitals, data centres, financial institutions, correctional facilities and other high-security operations where a security system failure is an operational event in its own right.
- Customized to the environment. Written around the specific site, its access protocols and its tolerance for interruption.
- Defined escalation process. Named contacts, escalation stages and decision points agreed in advance, not improvised during an incident.
- Customized service-level targets. Remote and on-site targets set against the criticality of each system area.
- Scheduled assessments. Deeper periodic review of architecture, redundancy, capacity and single points of failure.
- System documentation. Maintained device inventory, server topology, integration map and configuration baseline.
- Backup and recovery review. Regular verification that configuration and archive recovery works when tested, not just when scheduled.
- Coordination with IT and internal security teams. Change windows, patching, certificate renewal and network changes reviewed against the security system before they land.
- Multi-year support options. Longer terms available where continuity matters more than flexibility.
Comparing the four structures
Placeholders appear where the answer belongs in a signed agreement rather than on a public page.
| On-Demand | Preventive Maintenance | Priority Support | Mission-Critical | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coverage hours | 8:00 AM – 5PM | 8:00 AM – 5PM | 8:00 AM – 5PM | 8:00 AM – 5PM |
| After-hours availability | 24/7/365 | 24/7/365 | 24/7/365 | 24/7/365 |
| Remote-response target | 1.5 Hour | 1.5 Hour | 1.5 Hour | 1.5 Hour |
| On-site response target | 3.5 Hours | 3.5 Hours | 3.5 Hours | 3.5 Hours |
| Preventive-maintenance visits per year | Not included | Quoted | Quoted | Quoted |
| Included service hours | Not included | Optional | Quoted | Quoted |
| Priority scheduling | Not included | Not included | Included | Included |
| Configuration records retained | Not included | Included | Included | Included |
| System-health reporting | Not included | Included | Included | Included |
| Escalation process | Not included | Not included | Optional | Included |
| Multi-year term available | Not included | Included | Included | Included |
Coverage, availability and response targets are defined in each customer’s approved service agreement. Values shown as Quoted are set during scoping. Values shown as Optional can be added to the agreement at quotation.
Term structure
One-year, three-year and five-year terms
The three recurring agreements can each be written as a one-year, three-year or five-year term, subject to final commercial approval.
A one-year term suits a system you have just taken responsibility for, or a site where budget is approved annually. It gives you a full maintenance cycle and a documented picture of system condition before you commit to anything longer.
Three-year and five-year terms suit systems with a known lifecycle: a controller generation approaching end of support, a server platform due for replacement, a camera population being replaced in phases. A longer term lets maintenance visits, firmware alignment and hardware replacement be planned against each other instead of handled as separate emergencies.
Term length, escalation of rates across the term, renewal handling and termination provisions are all commercial matters settled in the agreement itself. Nothing on this page commits either side to any of them.
- One year. A full maintenance cycle and a condition baseline before longer commitment.
- Three years. Maintenance and planned upgrade work coordinated across a known hardware lifecycle.
- Five years. Continuity across a full platform generation, for sites where changing service providers is itself a risk.
How an agreement is put in place
No agreement is quoted from a phone call. The scope has to be built from the system that actually exists.
- 01 System review — A walk of the system as installed: controllers, doors, power distribution, servers, storage, workstations, integrations and current software versions. Undocumented change is common and is recorded rather than argued about.
- 02 Scope definition — Agreement on what is covered, what sits outside it, which sites are included and what the operation actually needs from response and reporting.
- 03 Quotation — Written quotation against the defined scope and the selected term, including coverage hours, response targets, visit frequency and any included hours.
- 04 Agreement and onboarding — Signed agreement, access and escort protocols confirmed, site contacts and escalation path recorded, configuration baseline captured.
- 05 Scheduled work and reporting — Maintenance visits run to the agreed calendar. Findings go into deficiency reports and health reporting. Service history accumulates against the site.
Common questions about service agreements
What happens if the system needs work beyond what the agreement covers?
It is quoted separately before it is done. An agreement covers inspection, testing, reporting and the support activity written into its scope. A failed controller, a storage array replacement, a migration or a major reprogramming project is project work.
Where an agreement includes preferred service rates, those rates apply to the additional work. Nothing outside the agreed scope is carried out without written approval, so there are no surprise invoices attached to a maintenance visit.
Does an agreement cover parts?
Not by default. Skyfal is a service company and does not sell security products, so parts are handled as a supply item quoted against the specific failure, or supplied by you or your existing product vendor.
Some agreements are written with a parts allowance or with agreed handling of spares held on site. That is a commercial decision made at quotation. If you already hold spare controllers, power supplies or drives, the agreement can be written around using them, which usually shortens restoration time considerably.
Will Skyfal take over a system installed by someone else?
Yes. That is most of the work. Systems arrive with partial documentation, undocumented programming changes, mixed hardware generations and firmware that has drifted apart across the device population.
The first step is a system review that records what is actually installed and what condition it is in. Findings are reported as findings, not used as leverage. If the previous provider did good work, that gets said too.
What does a deficiency report actually lead to?
A prioritized list, and a decision that stays with you. Each item is described in plain terms with its operational effect, and ranked by impact rather than by convenience.
Some items are corrected during the same visit. Some become quoted work. Some are recorded and monitored because replacement is not yet justified. Items carry forward between visits so you can see whether a condition is stable or getting worse, which is the part that matters when you are defending a capital request.
How is the term priced?
Against the scope, not against a rate card. Pricing follows from system size, site count, platform and version, visit frequency, coverage and response targets, and how much of the support can be handled remotely.
Term length affects the structure: longer terms are written with agreed handling of rate movement across the term. Final pricing and commercial terms are set in the approved agreement.
Can one agreement cover multiple sites?
Yes. Multi-site agreements are common for school boards, health organizations, financial branch networks and industrial groups running several properties on one head-end.
Sites can carry different coverage within a single agreement. A central data centre or a control room may warrant mission-critical terms while satellite properties sit on a preventive maintenance cycle. Reporting can be delivered per site, per region or consolidated. Service area is Southern Ontario, CA.
What this page is and is not
Coverage, availability and response targets are defined in each customer’s approved service agreement. Nothing described here creates a service level, a response commitment or a price until it is written into a signed agreement.
Skyfal Security is an independent service provider. It does not claim manufacturer authorization, certification, dealership or partner status, and it does not sell security products. Work is limited to service, programming, repair, server infrastructure, maintenance and support on systems that are already installed. See About Skyfal for the full scope of what is and is not taken on.
Get an agreement quoted against your actual system
Tell us the platform, the site count and what has been going wrong. The review comes before the quotation.