Selecting the right outsourcing partner

Its been some time since I put forth my views on transforming one's approach to outsourcing. The key of course is to select a partner who will help solidify that approach. Traditional price benchmarks seem to be the decisive driving factor towards vendor selection but would it necessarily ensure good customer centricity? The problem with the price argument is that it could be undercut any moment and doesn't really bring about any value added change. So what should corporations be looking at instead? I thought of a few guidelines which might  be good pointers in understanding if the outsourcing partner is likely to fit the bill or not. Of course, one might tick all the boxes and still come up short or maybe not tick any at all and be the best outsourcing deal. As a thumb rule though, i think these might be pretty useful.  Anyway, here are a few pointers I could think of: 

1. Whats the record in managing customer centric projects? Service Providers Service Delivery, SLA management, reporting, security compliance, communication and cost management capability
2. How do they handle their relationship with you: Organizations should look at the service providers’ ability to understand the business, align the appropriate resources, set up a robust governance and escalation model and collaborative set up
3. Do they have a proven Business Process Improvement plan? Assess the service provider for Quality methodologies, experience in delivering productivity improvements, continuous improvement frameworks and experience and measurable customer satisfaction metrics
4. Do they have any Innovations to show? Most importantly, corporations should analyze the service provider in terms of experience in implementing transformational changes like new technologies, delivery models and pricing mechanisms

A fair amount of analysis would be required to really get some quantifiable answers to the questions above..but spending the time and effort to get these answers would be totally worth it in the long run. After all, your outsourcing partner could well be the different between customer churn and customer delight!!