Support Escalation

Determine when and how to escalate support issues. Structure escalation briefs that give receiving teams everything they need to act quickly, and follow escalation through to resolution.

When to Escalate

• Technical: Bug confirmed and needs a code fix, infrastructure investigation, data corruption.
• Complexity: Beyond support's ability to diagnose, requires access support doesn't have.
• Impact: Multiple customers affected, production system down, security concern.
• Business: High-value customer at risk, SLA breach imminent, executive involvement.
• Time: Issue has been open beyond SLA, customer waiting unreasonably long.
• Pattern: Same issue reported by 3+ customers.

Escalation Tiers

1. Support Escalation (L1 -> L2): For deeper investigation or advanced troubleshooting.
2. Engineering Escalation: For confirmed bugs, infrastructure issues, code changes.
3. Product Escalation: For feature gaps, design decisions, prioritization.
4. Security Escalation: For potential data exposure, vulnerabilities, compliance (Escalate IMMEDIATELY).
5. Leadership Escalation: For high churn risk, SLA breaches, cross-functional decisions.

Structured Escalation Format

Every escalation should follow this structure:

ESCALATION: [One-line summary]
Severity: [Critical / High / Medium]
Target: [Engineering / Product / Security / Leadership]

IMPACT

- Customers affected: [Number and names if relevant]
- Workflow impact: [What's broken for them]
- Revenue at risk: [If applicable]
- SLA status: [Within SLA / At risk / Breached]

ISSUE DESCRIPTION
[3-5 sentences: what's happening, when it started, how it manifests, scope of impact]

REPRODUCTION STEPS (for bugs)

1. [Step]
2. [Step]
3. [Step]
   Expected: [X]
   Actual: [Y]
   Environment: [Details]

WHAT'S BEEN TRIED

1. [Action] -> [Result]
2. [Action] -> [Result]
3. [Action] -> [Result]

CUSTOMER COMMUNICATION

- Last update: [Date — what was said]
- Customer expectation: [What they expect and by when]
- Escalation risk: [Will they escalate further?]

WHAT'S NEEDED

- [Specific ask: investigate, fix, decide, approve]
- Deadline: [Date/time]