"1-hour response guaranteed" shows up on nearly every IT support website in Ontario. Here's how to actually evaluate that kind of claim — not just take it at face value.
Search for IT support in Ontario and a fast response time claim shows up in nearly every result. “1-hour response,” “rapid response guaranteed,” “we answer in minutes” — the specific wording varies, but the claims have become so common that they’ve stopped being a meaningful way to compare providers.
IT support response time is the amount of time between a support request being submitted and a technician beginning work on it — distinct from resolution time, which is how long the underlying problem actually takes to fix.
“Every MSP says they’re proactive. I’d rather show you than tell you.”
— Adam Bowles, Partner & CEO, ACT360
That same skepticism applies to response time claims. Here’s how to actually evaluate one instead of taking it at face value.
Why a Single Number Doesn’t Tell You Much
A blanket “1-hour response” claim sounds reassuring, but it leaves out the information that actually matters: response to what kind of issue? Measured how? Starting when?
A single-user printer issue and a company-wide network outage are not the same emergency, and treating them with the same response commitment usually means one of two things: either the number is generous enough to be meaningless for routine requests, or it’s not actually achievable for genuine emergencies. Realistic industry practice ties response time to severity — faster commitments for business-critical issues, more relaxed ones for low-urgency requests — rather than one number covering everything.
What “Response” Actually Means, and What It Doesn’t
Response time is frequently confused with resolution time, sometimes by accident and sometimes because the ambiguity is convenient for whoever’s making the claim.
Response time means someone acknowledged the ticket and started looking at it. It says nothing about how long the actual problem takes to fix. A provider can have an excellent response time and a mediocre resolution time, and a proposal that only quotes the first number is telling you less than it appears to.
Worth asking directly: is this response time, resolution time, or both? A provider with a clear, separate answer to that question is measuring something real. One that answers with the same vague number for both usually isn’t measuring the distinction at all.
How to Evaluate a Response Time Claim
A few direct questions cut through most marketing language:
- How is response time measured — from the ticket being submitted, or from when someone actually starts working on it?
- Is the response time the same for every severity level, or does it vary?
- What data can you show me on your actual average response time over the last quarter, not just the number in the proposal?
- What happens, contractually, if the response time target is missed?
- Does the response time change outside business hours?
A provider who can answer these with specifics is measuring their own performance. A provider who can only repeat the number from their marketing material likely isn’t.
What a Reasonable Range Looks Like
There’s no single correct number, but the following reflects realistic, achievable response times across the industry when broken down by severity:
- Critical issues (outage, security incident, business-stopping failure): 15-30 minutes is a realistic and achievable benchmark
- High-priority issues (a key system down, affecting a department): typically 1-2 hours
- Routine requests (single-user issues, minor changes): same business day or next business day is standard
If a provider quotes a single number faster than the critical-issue range above for every request regardless of severity, that’s worth double-checking rather than accepting at face value — either the number isn’t measured consistently, or it’s not sustainable at scale.
What This Looks Like at ACT360
Every MSP claims to be proactive and responsive. ACT360’s approach is to make severity-based response commitments specific and reviewable, rather than leaning on a single advertised number. Our quarterly business reviews include a look at actual performance against those commitments — not just tickets closed, but whether response times were met and why, when they weren’t.
That’s part of a broader pattern in how we operate: a 90-day exit clause on managed IT contracts, because a provider confident in its actual performance shouldn’t need a client locked in to prove it. For a deeper breakdown of how severity-based response commitments should be structured, see our guide to managed IT SLA expectations.
Final Thought
A response time claim is only useful if it’s specific enough to be checked. “Fast,” “rapid,” and “1-hour guaranteed” without a severity breakdown are the kind of language that costs nothing to put in a proposal. A provider willing to break the number down by severity, show real performance data, and explain what happens when a target is missed is giving you something you can actually evaluate — which is the entire point of asking in the first place.
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