BMC Helix Notification policy
A summary of the notification type, notifier, and notification recipient, and associated lead time is as follows:
Notification type | Notifier | Notification recipient | Minimum lead time or notification period (calendar days unless specified otherwise) | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Maintenance - scheduled releases
| BMC SaaS Operations | Customer Maintenance contact list | BMC Helix Service Management subscriptions
BMC Helix Operations Management and Common Services subscriptions
| See also Maintenance notifications. |
Maintenance - emergency | BMC SaaS Operations | Customer Maintenance contact list | ASAP | See also Maintenance notifications. |
Requests for Change (RFCs) | Customer Authorized Change Approver | BMC Change Advisory Board (CAB) | 24 hours | An RFC is requested by submitting a case for the request if using Support Central. To review the information BMC needs on an RFC request, see Change-documentation. |
New version releases | BMC Customer Success Specialist (CSS) | Customer Maintenance contact list | 30 days | New version releases for BMC Helix services usually follow the on-premises product release schedule by a matter of weeks. This allows the BMC SaaS Operations team time to test the release in the cloud environment and certify its readiness for SaaS customer consumption. |
BMC Helix iPaaS service updates | Self-service | Service updates for the BMC Helix iPaaS are published on the Jitterbit System Status page and are listed by region (NA, APAC and EMEA). You may subscribe to notifications for your location by selecting the Subscribe to Updates button in the upper right and entering your email address. There you will select which region(s) and platform(s) for which you'd like advance notifications. | ||
Security incidents | BMC SaaS Information Systems Security Officer | Customer Security contact list (note: if no security contacts exist, we will notify individuals on the Emergency contact list) | Within 24 hours after validation of the security event (business days) | Any type of security incident that affects your data or system is managed by BMC's SaaS Information Systems Security Officer. Notification may come in the form of a phone call and/or email. Only affected customer(s) are notified. |
Customer outage | BMC SaaS Operations | Customer Emergency contact list | As soon as the outage is confirmed by BMC | BMC SaaS Operations or BMC's monitoring tools will create a Severity 1 incident (production and non-production) and bcc: the customers' emergency notification list as soon as an outage has been confirmed. |
BMC-declared disaster | BMC SaaS Operations | Customer Emergency and Maintenance contact lists | As soon as the disaster is declared by BMC | Disaster recovery procedures begin immediately within your contracted Recovery Time Objective (RTO). See also Disaster Recovery options. |
Disaster recovery testing | BMC SaaS Operations | Customer Maintenance contact list | Six weeks (business days) | Disaster recovery testing events are available to Yearly Disaster Recovery Certification subscribers only. Tests are scheduled by BMC annually, by service location, and will not be scheduled over a routine maintenance or service update weekend. |
Maintenance and outage notifications
You will receive a system bulletin from the BMC SaaS Operations team if any of the following situations occur:
- A sudden downtime in the production environment because a service has stopped functioning
- An upcoming planned downtime for a BMC SaaS service (excluding those with a self-service option)
- Upcoming activities such as scheduled go-live announcements, month-end freeze reminders, and shutdown reminders
This notification might be addressed to a specific subgroup if the application is related to a certain set of users, or it might be sent as a global notification if an application downtime (or other general announcement) has occurred. Announcements that address the BMC end-user community are of critical importance and are presented clearly and carefully.
If downtime is required because of an approved change request, a system bulletin is sent a few days before and on the same day as the change request fulfillment. The bulletin also explains that the scheduled downtime is occurring because of an approved change request.
Every now and then a BMC-initiated change will require an extension to the change window in order to complete the request. When this situation arises, BMC SaaS Operations will provide a minimum of 15 minutes notification (prior to the end of the original scheduled window) to the customer. If an extension is necessary, the change window will be extended by one hour unless the extension notification states otherwise.
BMC Helix policy changes
BMC SaaS Operations updates its operational policies from time to time. Minor policy changes are not formally announced, however you may configure a "watch" notification for any of the policies which you would like to receive system notifications. To watch a page, select the eye icon in the upper right corner of the page. Any edits done to that page will push an email notice to you.
Major policy changes, although rare, will be communicated via email to each customer's general notification contact list.