Last Updated: September 15, 2026
ABOUT THIS DOCUMENT The following describes the availability, support, and recovery commitments for the LER.me platform. It forms part of the EBSCOed Software as a Service Agreement and applies where a customer Order incorporates it. Where a signed agreement between EBSCOed and a customer states different service levels, that agreement controls.
Introduction
This Service Level Agreement sets out what institutional partners, state agencies, workforce boards, employers, and other subscribers can expect from LER.me in day-to-day operation: how available the platform will be, how quickly EBSCOed responds when something goes wrong, how planned maintenance is handled, and how quickly service and data are recovered after a disruption.
It is written for the same audience as the Security Whitepaper and is intended to be read alongside it, along with the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
Availability
EBSCOed uses commercially reasonable efforts to make LER.me available with a monthly uptime of at least 99.9%, excluding scheduled maintenance and the circumstances listed under What Is Not Counted as Downtime below.
Downtime means any period greater than ten minutes during which users are unable to use the platform for its intended purposes, whether through application errors or through performance degradation that prevents ordinary actions from completing. Availability is the numeric inverse of Downtime. Monthly uptime is calculated as the total minutes in the calendar month less the minutes of Downtime, divided by the total minutes in that month.
EBSCOed measures and reports availability, downtime, and performance using its own monitoring systems. Availability reports are provided to subscribing partners on request.
EBSCOed also maintains the following performance targets. These are operational targets rather than commitments:
- Average page load time of under 3 seconds for most users
- API response time of under 500 milliseconds for 95% of requests
- Consistent performance under normal load, degrading gracefully under peak load
Hosting and Data Residency
LER.me is hosted in enterprise cloud data centers located exclusively in the United States. All user data is stored, processed, and backed up within the United States.
Where EBSCOed hosts a white label instance of the platform for a partner, that instance is hosted in the region identified in the applicable Order, which may be located outside the United States. Data residency and international transfer terms for those instances are set out in the Data Processing Addendum to the Software as a Service Agreement.
Scheduled Maintenance
Planned maintenance is scheduled during low-usage periods, and EBSCOed gives at least 48 hours notice where practicable. Scheduled maintenance is not counted as downtime.
EBSCOed may carry out emergency maintenance at any time where necessary to preserve the security, integrity, or continued operation of the platform, and gives notice as soon as practicable in the circumstances.
For a white label instance, maintenance windows are determined by reference to the hosting region and are set out in the applicable Order.
Support and Response Times
Support requests are submitted through the support portal at help.ler.me, or through another channel identified in the Order. Support is available Monday to Friday, 9:00 to 17:00 United States Eastern Time for all priority levels, and 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for Critical and High priority issues. An Order may specify different support hours or a different time zone.
Response times below are commitments. Resolution targets are operational targets rather than commitments, because the time required to resolve an issue depends on its nature and on factors that may be outside EBSCOed's control.
- Critical (P1): Complete service outage, or severe degradation affecting all users or critical business functions. Response within 30 minutes, 24/7. Work continues until the issue is resolved.
- High (P2): Major functionality unavailable but a workaround exists; affects a significant portion of users or business operations. Response within 2 hours, 24/7. Resolution targeted for the next business day or as soon as practicable.
- Medium (P3): Non-critical functionality issues or defects that do not significantly affect users or core operations. Response within 24 hours during business hours. Resolution targeted within 5 business days or in the next scheduled release.
- Low (P4): Minor issues, documentation requests, or general inquiries. Response within 48 hours during business hours. Resolution targeted for the next scheduled release or as resources allow.
Partners designate the contacts authorized to submit support requests, provide the information reasonably required to identify and reproduce the issue, and cooperate with EBSCOed in diagnosis and resolution. Response times run from receipt of a request containing that information.
For a white label instance, the partner provides first line support to the individuals it permits to use that instance, and support hours, support language, and escalation contacts are set out in the applicable Order.
Incident Communication
During a Critical or High priority incident, EBSCOed provides status updates at agreed intervals until the incident is resolved. Updates include a description of the incident, the systems affected, an estimated time to resolve, and next steps.
In the event of a confirmed security incident, internal teams are notified immediately via email, SMS, and collaboration tools, and affected clients and stakeholders are notified within 120 minutes of confirmation. Notification relating to a personal data breach is governed by the Data Processing Addendum.
EBSCOed conducts a post-incident review within 5 business days after any Critical or High priority incident, covering root cause, lessons learned, and preventive actions. A summary is provided to an affected partner on request, subject to confidentiality and to the exclusion of information relating to other customers.
Recovery Objectives
For Priority 1 events, including system unavailability or data breach, LER.me targets a Recovery Time Objective (RTO) of less than 4 hours and a Recovery Point Objective (RPO) of less than 1 hour.
These objectives are supported by resilient multi-zone architecture, replication to a backup region, point-in-time database recovery, and automated monitoring of all live systems and backups, as described in the Security Whitepaper. They are recovery objectives rather than commitments as to the outcome of any particular event.
Recovery procedures are tested periodically, with partial system tests conducted quarterly and full disaster recovery drills every six months. Results are provided to partners on request, subject to confidentiality.
What Is Not Counted as Downtime
The following are excluded from the calculation of downtime and from the availability commitment:
- Scheduled maintenance: Maintenance carried out as described above.
- Force majeure: Events beyond EBSCOed's reasonable control, including natural disasters, war, terrorism, civil unrest, acts of government, and loss of internet access.
- Third-party services: Acts or omissions of third-party providers, networks, or integrations outside EBSCOed's control, including internet service providers, identity providers, and third-party APIs.
- Partner environment and actions: Acts or omissions of a partner or its users, including unauthorized changes, incorrect configuration, use of the platform other than in accordance with the documentation, exceeding documented usage limits, and failures of the partner's own network connections.
- Security events: Interruptions arising from denial-of-service attacks or similar hostile activity, notwithstanding the operation of EBSCOed's security controls.
- Suspension: Any suspension of access permitted under the Software as a Service Agreement.
- Trial and preview features: Features identified as beta, trial, preview, or evaluation.
White Label Instances
Where EBSCOed provisions and hosts a separate, partner-branded instance of the platform, this document applies to that instance except as otherwise stated in the applicable Order. Because a white label instance is provisioned separately and hosted in the region identified in the Order, the Order may state a different availability commitment, support hours, maintenance windows, or response times for that instance.
Availability for a white label instance is measured separately for that instance.
Changes to This Document
EBSCOed may update this document from time to time. Where an update materially reduces the service levels described here, the update takes effect for an existing partner at the start of the next renewal term of the applicable Order, and EBSCOed gives notice of the change.
The revision date is shown at the top of this article. Previous versions are available on request through the support portal.