Ever thought why SLA is needed when one of your IT initiative is being executed and delivered via global delivery model ? Is it worth fretting about SLAs?
My understanding is that people still see outsourcing projects as a consumer product and suffer from "give me a perfect piece else I will ask for money back" syndrome. You have selected a service provider whom you consider is a specialist in the service you want. Instead of tying them down with stringent SLAs, it needs careful management of this relationship. SLAs should not be assumed as something that will meet its levels automatically regardless of how the relationship is managed.
Surveys shows that more than 50% of the IT outsourcing projects fail to meet customers’ expectations , which eventually makes it apparent that in most cases SLAs simply aren’t working. It is obvious to conclude that stringent SLAs may actually be part of the problem rather than the solution.
By pressuring service providers to meet strict time limits you may be encouraging them to cut corners or in no time at all the service provider may start to feel that they can’t win and a quasi-adversarial relationship develops between the customer and service provider.

It is more about customers placing greater trust in the professionalism of their IT service providers. So when you're out there looking for a specialist to do your job, do judge if they are professional enough to cater to your needs.

SLAs are not going to be abolished for the simple fact that it would be needed for some sort of legal recourse when deals go wrong, however, the stakeholders from both the sides should understand that SLAs can not be a replacement for the close monitoring and co-operation. Thereby, see if your service provider has means and tools that would allow you to collaborate with them, get regular visibility into whats going on 10,000 miles away from you so that you can continuously monitor the progress and avoid the need to resort to SLAs.
In one of his interviews, Chairman/CEO/Co-founder of Syntel, Mr Bharat Desai said that "A strong governance model is critical to communication. Syntel's model uses an Engagement Management Office (EMO). The EMO is staffed by both the customer and vendor and manages the relationship, user satisfaction, operations, quality, forecasting, reporting, contract compliance and more. As part of the EMO process, a steering committee with members from both the vendor and client side meet monthly or quarterly to ensure the engagements remain focused, on track and meeting the established service level agreement points."