25 August 2026 · TechSlideITS
What an ERP AMC should actually cover
An annual maintenance contract is easy to sign and hard to compare. Two quotes at similar prices routinely cover very different things.
An AMC is usually presented as a percentage of licence or project value, which makes it feel like a standard product. It is not. Two contracts at the same price can cover substantially different things.
The differences only become apparent when you need something.
The line between support and change
The most common dispute, and worth settling in writing before it arises.
Something broken is support. Something new is a change. The argument is always about the middle: a report that needs an extra column, a workflow that needs an extra approver, a print format that needs adjusting for a new statutory requirement.
What matters is not where the line sits but that it is drawn explicitly, with examples. A contract saying "reasonable support" has deferred the argument to the moment you are least able to have it calmly.
Response and resolution are different promises
Most contracts promise response time. Few promise resolution time, which is what actually affects you.
A four-hour response commitment means somebody replies within four hours. It says nothing about when billing works again.
Ask for both, and expect resolution commitments to be tiered by severity — billing down is not the same as a report formatting oddly. If the contract has one number for everything, it has not been thought about.
Coverage hours versus your operating hours
Support covering business hours is fine for a business that runs in business hours.
A hospital, a hotel, a plant on shifts, a restaurant open until midnight — these need to know what happens at 11pm. Sometimes the honest answer is that nothing happens until morning, and that may be acceptable, but it should be known rather than discovered.
Whether upgrades are included
Frequently ambiguous, and it matters more than it appears.
Applying a platform upgrade is work, and where you have customisations, every one must be tested against it. A contract that includes support but excludes upgrades means you either stay on an ageing version or pay separately each time — and staying still accumulates its own risk.
Clarify whether upgrades are included, how often they happen, and who tests the customisations.
Hosting responsibilities, if hosted
Where the same provider hosts the system, the AMC should state who does what:
- Server monitoring, and what triggers an alert
- Operating system and security patching
- SSL certificate renewal — a lapsed certificate takes the site down and is entirely avoidable
- Backup operation, and restore testing
- Storage growth, and who acts when it fills
These fall between application support and infrastructure, which is exactly why they go unowned.
What you are entitled to at the end
Worth asking before signing, when it is a routine question rather than a difficult one.
If the relationship ends, can you obtain a full database export in a usable format? Do you have access to any custom code written for you? Are integration credentials yours?
The answers are usually reasonable. Asking early establishes that you expect them to be.
Questions before signing
- Give three examples of what is support and three of what is chargeable.
- What resolution time applies to a business-stopping issue, as opposed to response time?
- What are your support hours, and what happens outside them?
- Are platform upgrades included, and who tests our customisations against them?
- What do we receive if we leave?
A provider who answers these clearly is telling you how they operate. One who deflects is telling you something too.
If you want to compare against how we structure support, see our managed ERPNext and Odoo hosting, or talk to us.
Frequently asked questions
An explicit line between support and chargeable change with examples, resolution commitments tiered by severity rather than just response times, stated coverage hours matched to your operating hours, clarity on whether platform upgrades are included, and — where hosted — who owns monitoring, patching, SSL renewal, backups and storage.
Response time is how quickly someone replies; resolution time is when the problem is fixed. Most contracts promise the first and few promise the second, but the second is what actually affects your business. Ask for both, tiered by severity.
The line between support and change. Something broken is support and something new is a change, but the middle — an extra column on a report, an additional approver, a print format adjusted for a new statutory requirement — is where the argument happens. Draw the line explicitly with examples before signing.
Clarify it explicitly, because it is frequently ambiguous and matters more than it appears. Upgrades are work, and every customisation must be tested against them. A contract covering support but not upgrades means either staying on an ageing version or paying separately each time.
Whether you can obtain a full database export in a usable format, whether you have access to custom code written for you, and whether integration credentials are yours. The answers are usually reasonable — asking early establishes that you expect them to be.