Warranty of a service

In some countries when you buy a toaster you get a warranty sticker, leaflet or some statement that says if something goes wrong for a prescribed amount of time from the date of purchase, then the toaster will be replaced, fixed or refunded.

In other countries that may be referred to as a guarantee.

So what is the warranty/guarantee for a service in the world according to ITIL? Well it's exactly the same thing, but given from four perspectives. Availability, Capacity, Security and Continuity.

IT Service Providers are asked to ensure that they have thought through these four issues - as they are the most basic considerations for any service - before they commit to providing that service to the business end users.

It is a good set of questions that forces the IT provider to look before they leap into a world of service level agreements that cannot be met, over promising and under delivering and generally building upon a reputation of being a poor service provider in the eyes of the business.

Utility, Warranty, Confusion, Mayhem

The new ITIL v3 Service Strategy book discusses a couple of interesting new concepts. The "utility" (fit for purpose) and "warranty" (fit for use) when looking at the "value creation" of a service.

To me, when I look at these terms and the surrounding text it seems to be a re-work of the Effectiveness (do the right thing - utility) and Efficiency (do things well - warranty) concepts that we’ve been familiar with under ITIL v2.

I wonder if anyone else is seeing basic concepts that we've grown used over the years reworked into something that is certainly different and potentially more confusing?