ESM subscribers can make use of both queues and or policers for both the ingress and egress traffic. The queue and policers are configured within SAP ingress and egress policies applied to the SLA profile. The policers (at egress only) and queues can parent to different levels and cir-levels with different weights and cir weights of a virtual scheduler configured within a scheduler policy, and to an egress port scheduler configured in a port scheduler policy, to achieve hierarchical traffic control. The policers can parent to different levels with different weights of an arbiter configured within a policer control policies to achieve hierarchical traffic control.