SLAs for Virtual Private Networks usually focus on availability. For example, a service provider may guarantee 99.9% uptime for all of their network equipment that is part of the VPN. Providers will usually not offer guarantees on performance or security, however, as these areas are much more difficult to measure quantitatively and fairly.

SLAs usually fail to offer full coverage for the customer's VPN, especially when they are using the Internet. SLAs apply only to the networking gear controlled by that provider. On the Net, many kinds of outages can result in significant downtime and poor performance for the customer, yet the provider may remain fully in compliance with their SLA.

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