Why Uptime Is the KPI That Really Matters in Service

Service organizations are drowning in metrics - response times, first-time fix rates, utilization. But none of these matter to your customer. What they actually care about is simple: Is my equipment running when I need it?

That’s why Uptime is the KPI that matters most.

The Trap of Internal KPIs vs. Uptime

Customers don’t buy machines to be fixed. They buy them to work.

Yet if you look at how most service organizations measure success, the focus is almost entirely on internal KPIs:

• First-Time Fix Rate (FTF)

• Mean Time to Repair (MTTR)

• SLA response compliance

• Technician utilization

These are useful measures, but they miss the bigger point. Customers don’t care about your internal efficiency. Take First-Time Fix as an example. It’s a great operational metric. Higher FTF usually means fewer truck rolls, lower service costs, and happier technicians. But here’s the catch: you can have an FTF of 90% and still have dissatisfied customers whose machines break down too often, or whose critical production lines suffer repeated interruptions.

The same applies to MTTR and SLA compliance. Closing tickets quickly or arriving within the agreed window looks good on paper - but if the asset is unreliable in the first place, the customer’s real problem isn’t solved.

Internal KPIs measure how well you run your service team, not how much value customers receive

Why Uptime Should Be the North Star

Uptime directly measures the outcome customers actually care about: reliable, available equipment that keeps their business running.

• It maps to customer value: Higher uptime means uninterrupted operations, lower costs, and higher productivity for the customer.

• It drives revenue: Customers are willing to pay premiums for uptime guarantees in service contracts, extended warranties, or subscription-based equipment models.

• It builds trust: When customers know their equipment “just works,” loyalty follows. They’re less likely to switch suppliers and more open to expansion offers.

Think about it this way: you can celebrate a 4-hour MTTR, but if that repair downtime caused a production line to miss a shipment worth millions, your customer doesn’t see success—they see failure.

How Leading Service Organizations Operationalize Uptime

Measuring uptime is not new, but digital technology has made it far more actionable. Forward-looking organizations are embedding uptime as a strategic outcome metric, enabled by:

• IoT and remote monitoring: Real-time visibility into asset health and usage enables proactive detection of early warning signals.

• Predictive analytics: Combining sensor data with service history allows failures to be anticipated and prevented, minimizing disruption.

• Availability-based SLAs: Manufacturers are shifting from response-time promises to guaranteed uptime commitments (e.g., 99.5% equipment availability).

• Outcome-as-a-service models: Service moves beyond maintenance to monetized outcomes, with customers paying for uptime rather than parts and labor.

A well-known example is Rolls-Royce’s ‘Power by the Hour’ program. Instead of charging airlines for parts and repairs, Rolls-Royce bills them based on the hours their engines are in operation. In other words, airlines pay for uptime, not fixes. This model aligns incentives perfectly: customers only pay when the equipment delivers value, and Rolls-Royce earns by ensuring maximum engine availability.

While not every manufacturer can replicate this at such scale, the principle applies across industries: customers value outcomes, not activities.

Rolls-Royce’s ‘Power by the Hour’ program prioritizes Uptime

Strategic Takeaway

First-Time-Fix. Mean Time To Repair. SLA compliance. These are useful operational levers—but they are not what customers value most.

Uptime is the North Star KPI. It is the clearest measure of whether your service organization is delivering real, outcome-based value.

Organizations that prioritize uptime:

• Capture greater share of customer wallet

• Strengthen long-term relationships

• Differentiate in increasingly competitive service markets

If your goal is to command premium pricing, deepen customer trust, and build resilience into your service business, measure what customers truly care about: equipment that works when they need it most.

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Author Info

Written by Mihir Joshi

After 15 years working with leading manufacturers, I created SmartServiceOps to share practical insights for the field service industry.