DORA Negotiations: Key Contractual Content In ICT Contracts

DORA

The Digital Operational Resilience Act ("DORA") requires that Financial Entities ensure that their ICT contracts include specific provisions that support business continuity, risk management, and regulatory compliance amongst other conditions imposed by DORA.

As a result, for any ICT Service Provider that wishes to retain captured Financial Entities as clients, some level of acceptance as regards integrating DORA related new contractual obligations must be accepted.

In this article, we shall explore some key essential themes for ICT Service Providers to consider when negotiating ICT contracts with Financial Entity clients.

1.Detailed Service Level Agreements

Having properly detailed Service Level Agreements ("SLAs") is a requirement in terms of DORA. Thus, those ICT Service Provider who only make available basic SLAs, or perhaps no SLAs at all, will need to be able to supply a more developed SLA meeting DORA's expectations.