Alex Solutions Product Support Policy

– as of September 2025

1. Scope of Support

Alex Solutions provides support for customers with a valid support agreement who are running supported versions of the Alex Platform and Scanners, deployed in environments that meet the documented minimum infrastructure requirements.

Supported versions: Releases within the last 12 months of the latest available release.

Unsupported environments include:

  • Versions older than 12 months behind the latest available release.
  • Environments not meeting minimum infrastructure requirements.
  • Customers without a valid support agreement with Alex Solutions.

The features in the Software may change when upgrades are made to the environment. Alex Solutions endeavours to maintain backward compatibility where feasible but cannot guarantee this in all cases for standard (non-customised) application component modules.


2. Support Services Provided

  • Incident triage and troubleshooting for supported products and configurations.
  • Bug reporting, reproduction guidance, and workarounds where available.
  • Bug fixes:
    • Critical issues (Level-1 and Level-2) are targeted for the next maintenance release (subject to verification, scope, and technical feasibility).
    • Non-critical issues are prioritized based on a variety of considerations such as severity, impact, release plans, etc.
  • Security issues handled by Alex Solutions’ security and support teams.
  • Access to maintenance releases, patches, and software updates.

Critical severity for application behaviour is defined within “Alex Platform/Scanner Service Level Objectives” below. Critical severity for security-related issues is defined as per the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) framework.


3. Incident Response and Service Level Objectives

3.1 Coverage hours by time zone / location

Alex Solutions provides support during standard business hours, 08:30 to 17:30, on a business day, aligned with the customer’s chosen primary time zone. The primary time zone is agreed at the start of the support contract and serves as the basis for measuring coverage and response times.

Extended Coverage:
Customers who need broader support — such as global teams or critical 24x7 coverage — can add extended support options. These may include:

  • Longer hours in the same time zone,
  • Additional time zone coverage, or
  • 24x7 coverage for Severity 1 (critical) issues.

Extended coverage options are available as Premium Support add-ons and can be arranged during contract setup.

3.2 Service Level Objectives

Alex Solutions measures initial response as the time between Customer submission within our Service Desk and first support specialist engagement during contracted coverage hours.

Service level objectives are targets and not contractual service guarantees.

3.2.1 Alex Platform Service Level Objectives

Severity Description Response Time SLO
Level-1 (Critical) Full or partial production system outage; critical business function unavailable. No workaround available. 4 business hours
Level-2 (High) Significant business impact; important features unavailable but operations continue. 8 business hours
Level-3 (Medium) Moderate business impact; partial, non-critical functionality loss. 2 business days
Level-4 (Low) Minor impact, cosmetic issue, or general question. 5 business days

3.2.2 Alex Scanner Service Level Objectives

Scanner Type Definition Support Model
Scanner Production-ready connectors built and maintained by Alex. Full support under standard SLOs.
Accelerator Connectors not under standard support due to complexity, maturity, or other factors. Best-effort support; may not meet standard SLOs.
Custom Scanner Bespoke or customised connectors. Supported on a Time & Materials (T&M) basis.

3.3 Definitions - Scanner Terms

Term Definition
Metadata Connector A utility for generating metadata suitable for ingestion into an Alex Platform environment. This could be performed by either retrieving metadata directly from a source, or by generating derived metadata based on other inputs such as source data or source metadata.
Scanner Scanners are production-ready metadata connector components built by Alex Solutions that are expected to be able to obtain the metadata that they target without customisation (except for localisation issues such as source server location, authentication details etc.).
Accelerator A metadata connector that does not fall under the standard Alex Solutions support model due to considerations such as complexity of metadata structure, connectivity, or maturity of the connector.
Custom Scanner A metadata connector that has either been customised from its originally supplied out-of-box configuration or developed as a bespoke scanner for a specific customer.
Scanner Completeness The percentage of assets and properties that the connector identifies, based on its current version and configuration, through primary metadata collection.
Scanner Accuracy The percentage of assets and properties that the connector identifies and retrieves, based on its current version and configuration, through both direct and "indirect" metadata collection / generation, such as through SQL Parsing and Data Profiling.

4. Critical Incident Management

For Level-1 (Critical) incidents, Alex and the customer collaborate continuously during coverage hours to restore service:

  • Customer ensures appropriate personnel are available (e.g., admins with system access).
  • Customer provides timely access (VPN/jump host) and required diagnostics.

If required personnel/access are unavailable, Alex may reclassify severity to Level-2 until prerequisites are met.

Once engaged on a Level-1, Alex works toward restoration without interruption (subject to coverage hours and resource management).


5. Incident Closure

An incident is considered resolved when any of the following occur:

  • The solution or guidance supplied restores service or answers the question.
  • A workaround is provided and accepted as a durable solution.
  • A software fix is available in a released version and the customer can upgrade.
  • The issue is tracked as an Enhancement Request.

Closure process:

  • Alex will request customer confirmation to close.
  • If no objection is received within 14 days of the closure request, the ticket is closed as Transferred to Customer.
  • If required information is not provided within 10 business days of request, Alex may close as Cancelled by Customer.

6. Customer Responsibilities

To ensure Alex Solutions can provide effective support, customers are responsible for the following:

  • Qualified Support Contacts: Assign trained personnel as official support contacts.
  • System Administration & Operations: Perform installation, configuration, upgrades, and maintenance; ensure backups and restore processes.
  • Compliance with Documentation: Operate products according to official documentation.
  • Collaboration During Support: Provide Alex with required access, diagnostic info, and personnel.
  • Monitoring & Awareness: Check Service Desk for updates, advisories, and discontinuation notices.
  • Safeguarding & Testing: Protect data and test upgrades before production deployment.

Failure to meet these obligations may result in Alex:

  • Charging T&M for additional/out-of-scope work,
  • Reclassifying incident severity, or
  • Declining services.

7. Diagnostic & Data Handling

Alex may request diagnostic data (logs, thread dumps, metadata samples) to troubleshoot.

Tools will be used in accordance with the customer’s security policies.

Alex will not access, use, retain or disclose customer data except as necessary to provide support services and in compliance with the customer’s security and confidentiality requirements.


8. Requesting Service

Support requests must be logged via the Service Desk (https://alexsolutions.atlassian.net/servicedesk/customer/portals).

Tickets may be raised 24×7; triage and response occur during contracted coverage hours (unless enhanced coverage is in place).

Required information includes product/version, environment, steps to reproduce the issue, observed vs. expected behaviour, and attachment of any relevant logs and screenshots.

Work continues in the next occurring coverage window until resolved, with updates provided per severity.


9. Access to Software Maintenance and Patch Releases

All maintenance and support service levels include access to software maintenance, patch, and fix releases.


10. End of Life Policy

Alex Solutions supports versions released up to 12 months prior to the latest available release (including minor releases).

Issues discovered will be prioritised under the Defect Resolution Policy.

Customers may be required to upgrade to access fixes.

Support may be declined where a customer is running an unsupported version and refuses to upgrade.


11. Eligibility

Support is open to customers’ system administrators and account holders only. End-users must escalate issues internally before contacting Alex Support.


12. Knowledge Prerequisites

Administering Alex Solutions products requires baseline technical skills, including:

  • Ability to run OS scripts (Unix shell / PowerShell).
  • Network configuration and troubleshooting.
  • Database administration and query execution.
  • Installing and maintaining production web technologies.

Alex Support provides guidance only and does not perform customer system administration tasks.


13. Unsupported Issues

  • Partners: Alex may refer to partners for training, customization, or extended services.
  • Third-Party Products & Cloud Environments: Documentation provided, but support not included.
  • Beta Releases: Unsupported. Release candidates may be eligible.
  • Customisation & Development Requests: Limited support; may be referred to partners.
  • Direct Database Modifications: Unsupported. Customers may be asked to restore to a supported state.
  • Deployment Planning: Falls under professional services.
  • New Feature Requests: Handled under Alex Solutions’ standard enhancement request process.

15. Known Limitations

Alex products, like all software, may contain known limitations or anomalies. These are documented in product release notes and documentation.


16. Future Updates

This policy may change from time to time, with notice provided to customers for material changes. The version posted on the official Alex website is the authoritative reference.


17. Warranty Disclaimer

Support services are provided “as is” and Alex Solutions disclaims all implied warranties, including merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose.