PeopleCert ITIL-SOA ITIL Service Offerings and Agreements Exam Practice Test

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Question 1

Scenario

An IT services company provides IT services to many customers. The company has grown rapidly over the last three years and has recognized the need to implement service management processes to ensure that they continue to provide services that meet their customer's needs. A service management implementation project was set up a year ago and most processes are now in place including service level management and service catalogue management. In addition a business relationship manager has been allocated.

An opportunity has arisen to engage a new customer, which could lead to a very large contract. Contact has been made with the potential customer and a meeting arranged. This will be the first time that these processes have been used to engage a new customer and the IT service manager wishes to make sure that all concerned are clear of their roles.

Refer to Scenario

Which one of the following options CORRECTLY assigns the responsibilities to the service level manager, service catalogue manager and the business relationship manager?

Responsibilities:

AService catalogue manager - 3, 7, 8, 9
Service level manager - 1, 2, 4
Business relationship manager- 5, 6, 10

BService catalogue manager - 1, 7
Service level manager - 3, 4, 6, 8, 10
Business relationship manager- 2, 5, 9

CService catalogue manager - 1, 8
Service level manager - 2, 3, 5, 9
Business relationship manager- 4, 6, 7, 10

DService catalogue manager - 1, 8, 9
Service level manager - 2, 3, 5, 7, 10
Business relationship manager- 4, 6

Answer : D

Question 2

Scenario

A company provides an internet-based gift delivery service which is highly dependent upon IT services provided by the internal IT organization. A year ago the customer payments service that supports the gift ordering website regularly experienced poor availability. The organization hired a service management consultant to assess why the IT services were performing poorly and to rectify the situation.

As part of the solution, the consultant implemented service level management and adopted the role of interim service level manager. Service level agreements were negotiated with the business and agreed. The necessary underpinning agreements were negotiated and put in place. Regular monitoring and reporting was implemented. Monthly service review meetings with the business unit managers were established to discuss IT service performance and any issues and improvements. Within a year of the start of the initiative the gift ordering website IT service was performing at 98.7% availability, a significant improvement.

This month's service review meeting was attended by the chief executive officer (CEO) after concerns were expressed about the most recent availability figure for the customer payments service, which was 94%. This covered the period which included one of the traditionally most popular gift ordering times. The consultant stated that the poor availability was almost entirely due to an incident that occurred during one of the busiest periods and. as a result, the overall monthly availability percentage was low. Initial investigation has shown that the service desk used the SLA to designate the incident as a 'Priority 2'. This was however lower than the 'Priority 1" the business believed the incident should have been. The subsequent delay in restoration of the service meant some customer orders were lost.

The CEO reminded the consultant that a repeat of such an incident would not only have a major effect on monthly revenues but also seriously affect the company's reputation. The consultant agreed that this was unacceptable and committed to review this issue and report back to the CEO.

Refer to Scenario

AThe SLM should agree with the business managers to set up a service improvement plan (SIP) to address the issue. Differing views relating to the cause of the low availability mean it should be investigated thoroughly to establish whether the slow restoration of service was due to a lack of understanding by the service desk, incorrect service level targets in the SLA or simply that, owing to the type of failure, restoration was always going to take that length of time. Appropriate action can then be taken to rectify the issue.

BThe issue is with the service desk and its incorrect interpretation of the SLA and failure to escalate the issues. The SLM should agree to set up a SIP for the service desk. The operational level agreement (OLA) with the service desk should be reviewed to ensure that it underpins the SLAs. The SIP should include the retraining of the service desk staff. A complete review of the service desk tools should ensure that they can be used to prioritize incidents correctly by passing through targets agreed into the priority matrix of the toolset.

CThe issue is clearly a breakdown in understanding regarding the critical business periods and the matching of these to the availability targets in the SLAs. The SLM should agree with the business managers to set up a SIP to investigate the issue. The SLAs should be reviewed with the business to ensure that they match with the business needs and, if necessary are updated. Review and update any underpinning agreements as necessary to ensure that they support the targets in the SLAs.

DThe SLM should conduct an investigation by reviewing incidents and problems. Ask the IT service desk and support staff what ideas they have to resolve the issue. Review the impact on all other SLAs. OLAs contracts and procedures. Review the maturity associated with the service level management process and take steps to improve this process if necessary. Create a SIP with an associated business case for presentation to the chief executive officer (CEO).

Answer : A

Question 3

Scenario

A large, privately owned company has an internal IT organization that runs most of its IT operations from the head office. There has been a history of confusion about what is required from the services and what has actually been achieved, particularly from a warranty perspective. This has resulted in a strained relationship between the business units and the IT organization.

Some service-based agreements exist between IT and the customers, where all levels of response to incidents were set to the same targets. Availability targets have not been reviewed for at least two years. There have been a number of complaints by key customers claiming that the IT staff have been resolving incidents and implementing change requests based on operational ease rather than business priority. This is despite operationally robust processes being in place for incident, change and problem management.

A plan has been put in place to improve the level of the IT service delivered to the organization.

Retirement of the post-holder meant that the first action was to appoint a new IT director. The opportunity was taken to select a candidate from an external organization, who was committed to the ITIL framework. The new IT director believes that good IT service management practices are essential.

The IT director plans to implement many of the service management processes and has already overseen the creation of a basic service catalogue. The IT director is sure that many of the current issues can be rectified through the implementation of service level management (SLM) and has therefore directed that service level agreements (SLA) be introduced for the services provided before moving onto other areas. You have been asked to lead the project to establish SLAs for the IT services.

Refer to the Scenario.

Which one of the following sequence of activities would be the BEST approach to establishing service levels agreements (SLA) in the organization?

AIdentify all of the services currently delivered using the service catalogue.
Define a primarily customer-based approach to implementing service levels agreements (SLAs).
Using a pre-prepared pro-forma service level requirements (SLR) template, meet with the appropriate customer representatives to discuss and document their service level requirements.
Arrange meetings with the appropriate IT teams, specifically those involved in incident, availability and capacity management, to discuss, document and agree the levels of service required.
Draft agreements from these discussions are then reviewed by service operations to ensure that no existing agreements will be compromised and, once this has been confirmed, the
SLA is formally reviewed, agreed, and signed by both the customer and IT.
The service level targets are then formally communicated, monitored, reported upon and reviewed at the agreed intervals.

BIdentify all the services currently delivered using the service catalogue.
Define a primarily service-based approach to implementing service level agreements.
Using the service templates already in use, meet with the appropriate customer representatives and, after discussion, produce formal SLRs which document the levels of service that the customer needs.
Arrange meetings with the appropriate IT teams, specifically those involved in incident, availability and capacity management, to discuss, document and communicate the levels of service required.
From these discussions operational level agreements (OLAs) are then produced.
The SLRs and OLAs can be formally monitored, reported upon and reviewed at the agreed intervals.

CMeet with the IT operations team, specifically, those involved in incident, availability and capacity management, to define what level of service they can offer to the business against each service in the service catalogue.
Meet with the appropriate customer representatives to give them a clear understanding of the levels of service IT can offer.
Produce and agree an SLA and ensure it is signed by representatives of both parties.
Document and agree OLAs with the service operation teams.
Ensure all parties understand their responsibilities and enforce penalties for non-compliance.
Once both agreements have been signed, all service level targets are then formally monitored and reviewed.

DIdentify all of the services currently delivered using the service catalogue.
Define a primarily service-based approach to implementing service level agreements.
Meet with the appropriate business representatives and, after discussion, produce a formal SLA that guarantees the levels of service that the business needs.
Arrange meetings with the appropriate IT teams, specifically those involved in incident, availability and capacity management, to inform them of the service levels you have agreed
Document and agree OLAs with the service operation teams.
Once these are agreed and signed the OLAs are passed back to the business to demonstrate that IT will support the SLA and to build upon the trust between the two parties.

Answer : A

Question 4

A major international company owns shopping malls in many countries. They are responsible for the security, safety and comfort of shoppers visiting the stores in the mall and the facilities management of the locations. The company relies on IT services provided by its IT division. The IT division consists of a corporate IT department at the company's headquarters and a local IT team at each mall. The IT division obtains IT services and products from over 100 different suppliers globally.

The management of suppliers within the IT division is currently performed by the local IT teams in each country, often by the most appropriate technical manager. This has resulted in inconsistent processes and levels of service across the countries.

The management team realizes that this is an ineffective use of IT resources and will have an impact on the future growth of the company. They are currently reviewing the situation and wish to develop supplier management processes that are more closely aligned to ITIL practices. The management team recently conducted a survey of all of the local IT teams within the different countries to collect details about the number and type of contracts and suppliers.

The IT division has developed and implemented many other ITIL processes over the last two years, which has led to significant improvements. The management team would like to build on this success and develop and implement a supplier management process. You have recently joined the corporate IT department and have been given the results of the survey carried out by the management team.

Refer to Scenario

Which one of the following options is the BEST sequence of activities to adopt in order to implement a supplier management process and to bring the current situation under control?

A1. Design and develop a supplier management process.
2. Define and agree a supplier policy.
3. Use the results of the survey to categorize each supplier to determine the type of relationship required.
4. Establish and populate a supplier and contract management information system (SCMIS) from the survey feedback.
5. Deploy the process in the corporate IT department as a pilot.
6. Agree which individuals in the corporate IT department and local IT teams are accountable for the management of each contract and supplier.
7. Deploy the process in the remaining countries and conduct a program of awareness and training.

B1. Define and agree a supplier policy.
2. Design and develop a supplier management process.
3. Use the results of the survey to categorize each supplier to determine the type of relationship required.
4. Establish and populate a SCMIS from the survey feedback.
5. Agree which individuals in the corporate IT department and local IT teams are accountable for the management of each supplier.
6. Deploy the process in all countries and conduct a program of awareness and training.
7. Identify where there are duplicate or multiple contracts in place with suppliers and instigate an initiative to review these with the relevant suppliers.

C1. Carry out a further review of the suppliers used by each store in each country.
2. Establish and populate the SCMIS from the results of the exercise.
3. Design and develop a supplier management process.
4. Define and agree a supplier policy.
5. Appoint a supplier manager from the corporate IT department to manage all contracts and all suppliers.
6. Deploy the process in all countries and conduct a program of awareness and training.
7. Renew all contracts to try to obtain better terms and conditions.

D1. Define and agree a supplier policy.
2. Agree which individuals in the corporate IT department and local IT teams are accountable for the management of each supplier.
3. Use the results of the survey to categorize each supplier to determine the type of relationship required.
4. Establish and populate a SCMIS from the survey feedback.
5. Design and develop a supplier management process.
6. Deploy the process in all countries and conduct a program of awareness and training.
7. Work with the service level manager to ensure that all contracts correctly underpin service level agreements.

Answer : D

Question 5

Scenario

An IT security company provides secure data services to many large financial organizations in several countries. The company has an administrative headquarters in its home country and a data centre in each country of operation.

Each data centre obtains support for services from third-party contracts provided by a number of suppliers. All supporting services are scoped and documented, and are aligned to the corporate strategy and the regulations in force in each country. The security services company maintains and regularly reviews a preferred supplier list from which suppliers are selected as required.

A service desk function is provided by one of the suppliers. Over the last 10 years, a strong relationship has been built up with the supplier based on the high-quality, consistent service they have provided. The nature of the financial business requires the service desk contract to contain severe penalty clauses that can be enforced if the agreed service levels are not maintained, although these have never been required.

A number of complaints have been received from a new banking customer highlighting that, over the previous three months, the level of service provided by the service desk in the management and handling of incidents has been inconsistent, and many incidents have not been resolved in line with agreed targets.

The IT security company has a service level manager who has performed the role for many years. Recently, a new supplier management process was implemented and a supplier manager appointed. Some confusion has arisen over how, and by whom, the recent complaints should be dealt with.

Refer to the Scenario.

You have been asked to resolve the confusion over the service level manager and supplier manager roles. Which one of the following options BEST represents the correct division of responsibilities and will also address the current complaints regarding the service desk supplier?

AService level manager: Apologize to the customer and compensate them financially for the poor service levels. Assure them that, under the terms and conditions of the contract, a review with the service desk will be carried out and that the supplier will be strictly monitored against agreed targets and penalties imposed, potentially leading to contract termination.
Carry out a risk analysis of the supplier and their contract.
Supplier manager: Log the complaints. Set up a review of the supplier and the service desk function. Invoke the contract's penalty clause to recover compensation from the supplier. Increase the supplier's risk rating. Initiate a service improvement plan in conjunction with continual service improvement.

BService level manager: Log the complaints. Inform the customer that the complaints will be reviewed as a matter of urgency. Collect evidence of failures and pass to the supplier manager. Ensure that the complaints are dealt with efficiently and effectively and improvements are initiated where appropriate. Keep the customer informed of both progress and outcome.
Supplier manager: Arrange a meeting with service desk supplier to investigate the complaints. Review performance of the supplier for all the services they deliver to the company's customers. Report findings back to service level manager.

CService level manager: Log the complaints. Inform the customer that the complaints will be discussed with the supplier at the next scheduled review meeting. Assure the customer that the contractual disputes process will be invoked to ensure that the complaints are dealt with in an efficient and effective manner. Inform the customer of the actions taken.
Supplier manager: Discuss the complaints with the supplier at the next review meeting
Initiate the dispute process with the supplier. Carry out a risk analysis of the supplier and their contract.

DService level manager: Inform the customer that the complaints will be reviewed as a matter of urgency. Assure the customer that a disputes process is in place to ensure that the complaints are dealt with in an efficient and effective manner. Inform the customer that they will be updated on the outcome. Review performance of the supplier for all the services they deliver to the company's customers.
Supplier manager: Log the complaints. Quickly arrange a meeting with service desk supplier to investigate the complaints. If necessary, initiate the dispute process.

Answer : B

Question 6

Scenario

A clothing manufacturer has made a decision to supplement factory-based retail outlets by opening a series of stores at out-of-town shopping malls.

The internal IT organization provides support to many mission-critical business systems for both the manufacturing and retail operations. It must increase its portfolio of services and service options to meet the planned new expansion. Typically, the business is subject to seasonal patterns of demand, which recently have begun to exceed the capability of some of the IT services. This has led to periods of poor performance of some of the critical systems and therefore to degraded service quality. In periods of minimal demand, there is a surplus of capacity and performance is optimal.

There is concern that the additional business demand from the new stores will exacerbate these service performance issues.

The board of directors, made up of representatives from each business unit, has asked for a review of the business supply and demand issues currently being faced by the IT organization. Many service management processes have been implemented including service portfolio management and capacity management. However, IT does not have a demand management process.

Additionally, performance levels on many of the supporting services have remained unchanged for the past 3 years, even though some may now be less relevant to the overall performance of the critical services.

Refer to the Scenario.

The review of the supply and demand issues concluded that the implementation of a demand management process could help the IT organization address the issues. Which one of the following options provides the BEST solution to both the problems currently being faced and those related to the proposed expansion?

AThe service portfolio should be reviewed and an analysis carried out of each business unit's requirements in order to understand their patterns of business activity (PBA) and corresponding usage of the IT services.
Differentiated service offerings should be developed to match PBA; this will make better use of available IT resources. Supporting service performance targets should be amended to reflect these changes.
Work with business relationship management and capacity management to develop long term plans to meet the extra demand resulting from the company's expansion plans.

BAn analysis should be carried out of each business unit's patterns of business activity (PBA), and appropriate services for each business unit selected from the service catalogue.
In conjunction with the finance department, a revised cost model should be introduced to allow for the fluctuation in usage and costs.
Differential charging should be introduced to address the issues of service quality.

CThe service portfolio should be reviewed and an analysis carried out of each business unit's requirements to understand their current usage of the IT services and where seasonal variations lead to fluctuations in usage.
Discussions should take place with the business units to impose limits within specific time periods for each business unit's usage of IT services.
Work with business relationship management and capacity management to develop long term plans to meet the extra demand resulting from the company's expansion plans.

DThe service portfolio should be reviewed and the business unit's cumulative service usage should be reviewed, monitored and analyzed.
Work with the business to develop short-term measures to manage demand for the IT services, such as delayed or batch processing of retail transactions.
Service levels should be reviewed to take into account changes to supporting service performance targets and, where applicable, agreements should be updated through change management.

Answer : A

Question 7

Scenario

A flower delivery company introduced ITIL-based service management processes 12 months ago.

One major benefit of the associated service improvement initiatives was that the service availability of the business critical on-line flower ordering IT service increased from 97% to 98.9% over the last quarter. This exceeds the service availability target of 98.5%. Last month, reports were circulated showing the availability improvement.

The service level manager is chairing a service review meeting to review the progress and report upon this achievement. The customer managers acknowledge the improvement but despite the reports of improved service availability, a major service outage occurred during the busiest week of the year when over 25% of the annual business revenue is normally earned. Although IT dealt with the outage satisfactorily, the loss of revenue and credibility in this mission critical, high-visibility trading period are serious concerns. The customer managers are concerned that the reporting does not seem to reflect this or their actual perception of the service.

Agreement is reached at the meeting to address two primary concerns:

1. Service availability targets for the mission critical periods are to be revised.

2. Amended and more representative business reports are to be produced.

Refer to the Scenario.

Which one of the following options will BEST ensure that the primary concerns related to the revision and reporting of targets are addressed?

ADetermine what information each IT team can provide regarding the collection and reporting of component availability. Implement revised mechanisms for the analysis, calculation and reporting of service availability. Ensure that event management is implemented to trigger alerts in response to availability issues. This will allow for reactive measures to be introduced so that, if services fail to meet their availability targets, proper actions can be taken to mitigate future failures.

BMeet with the customer managers to conduct a thorough review of all services and document all revised service level requirements (SLRs), ensuring that business impact and seasonal variations are taken into account. The SLRs should be transformed into a balanced scorecard of service targets with a dashboard for reporting purposes. Mechanisms should be agreed and implemented to collect, analyze and report against the agreed service targets using the change management process. Reports should be circulated to customer managers five working days in advance of service review meetings.

CMeet with the customer managers to review and document their availability requirements, ensuring that business impact and seasonal variations are taken into account. Review the monitoring and measurement mechanisms and ensure that they can measure both component and end-to-end service availability. Agree the revised service availability reporting requirements with the customer. Agree and revise service level agreements and operational level agreements as necessary and implement any changes to the monitoring and reporting mechanisms using the change management process.

DReview the requirements for service availability against the data collection and measurement currently provided by the IT teams. Design availability metrics and controls to report any variances at the monthly service review meetings, as well as how these variances will be addressed in the future. Internal IT staff and a customer manager will attend the service review meetings. All changes have to be agreed in the service review meetings before any actions can be performed, thus forcing the customer to come to the meetings and reach agreement before any improvement work or change can occur.

Answer : C