Service acceptance criteria

• 22 March 2023
• service management

I used to have a spreadsheet that's a big long list of questions. The questions helped me determine whether we were ready to accept a new service into live.

At the start of the project, I reviewed this list and used it to add requirements to the requirements specification so that they would have to be met by the project.

Then as the project progressed I kept rechecking the list and determine if any of my other checks had suddenly become relevant.

I found out that this is a common practice and in the ITIL world, it's known as the Service Acceptance Criteria. So I formalised the document and added it to our project management framework.

So what kinds of things are on my checklist? Here's a brief overview:

• Does everyone have the access they need?
• Have all the stakeholders been made aware of the project and do they know what processes they need to change?
• Has the Service Desk been given an overview of the change and do they have the documentation to support it?
• Has the Service Desk system been updated to accommodate the change e.g. is there an option in self service to request access to the new service; can the Service Desk reference the new service when raising a ticket for it?
• Are all the new CIs in the CMDB?
• Have any decommissioned CIs been marked as such in the CMDB?
• Has the new service been included into the scope of the capacity and performance management processes?
• Have the new components been absorbed into the patching cycle?
• Are any known end-of-life dates recorded in the EOL database (e.g. software support end dates)
• Is the system being monitored?
• Has the service support model changed?
• Do we have contact details for new vendors?

If you don't have a list like this, there are plenty of examples on the web to get you started. No list will be exhaustive though and no list will know about criteria that are specific to your organisation. You will learn of some when it's too late, but make sure that they get added to your list for next time. Review your list for improvements after the project has finished and the new service is fully embedded in the organisation.

• Previous: Handovers
• Next: Know your infrastructure