The Price You Pay

If you do the Twitter thing, follow me at @HousingITguy or LinkedIn here https://uk.linkedin.com/in/tonysmiththathousingitguy

It’s a typical conundrum, how do you do your best to keep software implementations on-time?

I was asked this the other week and (as you do) drifted into a long and varied discussion into ‘service credits’, other penalties and contract conditions. While I am not a massive advocate of reaching for your application software contract, every five minutes. However, it should be somewhere close to hand and able to be ‘playfully waved about’ when needed.

The purpose of the contract is of course to protect both parties, if executed properly. In that sense, its best partly a compromise by both. Specific penalties are useful, although they are no guarantee or pot of gold if things go wrong.

For example, I have seen clients get them selves in knots coming up with elaborate service credits, but in the big scheme of things, these often amount to maybe only a few hundred pounds in a particularly performing month. Raising a credit for under a grand is no biggie to most suppliers, that’s unlikely to change habits anytime soon.

One off penalty payments hanging over delivery or implementation can be another misnomer. On one occasion I had a client clearly unhappy with their supplier, for a number of reasons, over a number of years. Routinely, they would insist on penalties of a few grand, to guard against long delays (of which they had experienced many). I was on site one morning of a project meeting with the supplier, their account manager and a manager from the software house at director level. The client correctly pointed out in a contract where there was a £9k penalty. The project was nearly 18 months late.

Depressingly the (well known) supplier director, analysed the small print and replied, “Yes – we will pay that”. He was then looking for some look of gratitude or a ‘Thank You Mate’ I guess. Of which he didn’t get one. Nor should he either as that 18 month overrun had perhaps caused four staff to need a new temporary workaround and having lost the opportunity for some serious transformation. The £9k was barely touching the sides.

Personally, my favourite clause in contracts based on overruns is getting senior software people of director level in the meeting with you each month. Then they might see for themselves the unpleasant SMT style meeting prior to the project one, where ICT and the project manager get ritually flogged. Directors of software houses getting a taste of that pain themselves can be really helpful. Spookily enough after having their ar*e dragged in to those for a few months, that can be much more effective than raising a few credit notes.

Subscribe to our blog here on this link, to always catch the latest news on whats happening in the sector.

Acutance Consulting would be happy to help you review systems options, 

please just get in touch, for a chat over a brew ☕😋

       Related Post: Any idea even where your software contract is? 

Catch the blog monthly archive at https://soundcloud.com/housingitguy/

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I would be pleased to connect with you on LinkedIn - http://uk.linkedin.com/in/tonysmiththathousingitguy Message me with any issues or queries, you would like to be explored in this blog. We generally receive a couple of suggestions each month.

Savatage - The Price You Pay.
(c) Tony Smith, Acutance Consulting www.acutanceconsulting.co.uk 07854-655009


Access a quick list of our Social Housing ICT blog posts here

Could we help you or your organisation? Our contact details are here , get in touch we will be pleased to chat about your problems and help with your organisation issues.

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Thieves Like Us

If you do the Twitter thing, follow me at @HousingITguy or LinkedIn here https://uk.linkedin.com/in/tonysmiththathousingitguy

In lots of the system and process Critical Friend work I regularly get involved with, I see plenty of wide open goals, which could easily enable internal fraud.

Early on, here in this blog, I must declare my honesty, you can of course trust a boyhood good Catholic and altar boy. I can assure you that I have never had to confess to breaking the eight commandment.

However, a father of one of my primary school friends (a senior in the St Vincent De Paul Society too), was hauled off for a six month stretch at HM's Pleasure, for swapping his gas meter connections around a few weeks each quarter. He was only caught when British Gas found one quarter he (accidently) supplied more gas to them than he had from them (apparently). As with all criminal dodges, it was sussed in the end when mistakes were made and they asked for three years of similar crimes to be also taken into account too.

Who knew that swapping your gas meter pipes around, would run an analogue meter backwards? Maybe that’s why suppliers are almost falling over themselves, to tempt us over to Smart Meters?

I don’t think I have a particularly criminal mind, but in one of my early jobs in retail ICT at Littlewoods Liverpool, I did a lot of work with the internal auditor, particularly with the payroll packages. We did have a payroll of over 32,000 staff, so it was an area that got attention pretty much every other month. His name (strangely) was Gerry Myers. I learn't a lot through the questions he asked, bespoke reports he wanted etc, It was a real insight into how a criminal mind might work, or a detective. He kind of had the charisma of Columbo, without the cigar, (just when you think you have seen the back of him, he would ask, “Just one more thing….”).

System and project reviews for me often identify numerous security holes that I recognise, like those in a 16 month matured Swiss cheese. For example, obsessive system control of responsive repairs budget is common. If a kitchen repair SOR cost escalates from £85 to £365, the repairs team experience a grilling like the Spanish Inquisition. There is generally a tight audit trail of authorisation for a DLO or key partnering contractor. It's very rare these are not tightly linked to the finance purchase ledger too. Trying to embezzle here, is as crazy as trying to gemmy open an ATM cash machine.

However, where external contractors are used with manual replication of documents in the finance purchase ledger, or fed from a hefty (multi-million pound) capital/cyclical budget, there is often rich pickings, even if just a few % can be creamed off, there’s a few hundred grand per annum for the taking. Unbelievably easily stolen in plain sight.

One project I was involved in for a large Midlands based landlord, involved automating asbestos surveys and any follow-on work, updating Asset register and leaving a good audit trail. While we had rolled this out for reactive and voids work, the planned/capital/cyclical team, said, “we can't work like that”. The reason was that team were not actually in control of ordering asbestos surveys. They just added a PO to the value of the monthly invoices when they came in. The budget was over £600k for asbestos annually. I explained how between three of us, we could pocket 3 x £20k each annually, by just starting a convenient arrangement to raise £60k of bogus orders, which would always just be paid. For all I knew it might already have been happened by accident now and again!

Its tempting to put specialist compliance/cyclical contractors totally in charge of doing the work, with few checks & audit etc. Gas service & LGSR is a very common situation for this. Where there are few controls, poor/missing integration to finance, apart from the staff cost of waste due to double-handling, it’s an open goal to the unscrupulous.

There have been plenty of cases that have come to court, the latest being one at Greenwich Council, where last month two Council workers were jailed, over a £1.5m false repair contracts fraud. A nice little earner for using the technique I have outlined above, this time by arranging bogus lift works and servicing. Nice little earner, read more on it here.

This is one of many. 

When I was at one of the HMS system suppliers in a past life, there was a case in 2005 where a two handed social housing DLO con of over £330k was perpetrated over just 7 months. Read about that one here -  There were plenty of integration, checks and balances in the supplied solution, however few were implemented and audited, by the landlord. You can bet they certainly were put in, after that court case.

Internally audit must remain vigilant, it should not and cannot be just a tick-box exercise. Trust your audits or system reviews, think like a thief and be sure to prioritise plugging any gaps found. While improving organisation security, internal efficiency will also be improved, opening the door to effective transformation.

Subscribe to our blog here on this link, to always catch the latest news on whats happening in the sector.

Acutance Consulting would be happy to help you review systems options, 

please just get in touch, for a chat over a brew ☕😋

       Related Post: How can landlords manage repair complaints better for everyone 

Catch the blog monthly archive at https://soundcloud.com/housingitguy/

_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/

I would be pleased to connect with you on LinkedIn - http://uk.linkedin.com/in/tonysmiththathousingitguy Message me with any issues or queries, you would like to be explored in this blog. We generally receive a couple of suggestions each month.

New Order - Thieves Like Us.
(c) Tony Smith, Acutance Consulting www.acutanceconsulting.co.uk 07854-655009


Access a quick list of our Social Housing ICT blog posts here

Could we help you or your organisation? Our contact details are here , get in touch we will be pleased to chat about your problems and help with your organisation issues.

File Under: #HomesForBritain,#HousingDAY,#InternetOfTenants,#Shout,#UKHousing, 07854655009, 1st Touch,1stTouch,360,365Agile,3squared,4Js, ACL,ALMO,AMS,AX,Aareon,Abritas,Academy,Accuserv,Accuserve,Active Housing,ActiveH,ActiveHousing,Acutence,Advanced,Affinity,Agile,Agile365,AirWatch,Alfresco,Alignment,Allpay,Amazon Web Services,Anite,Apex,App,ArchHouse,Archouse,Asprey e-state pro,Asset Management,Associates,Aurora,Average IT Costs,AWI SX Integration Toolkit,AWS, BI,BO,BPR,BancTec,BigChange,Blockwise,BluTek,Bluebox,Blueprint,Browser Applications,Business Objects,Business Planning,Business Process Review,Business social networking, CACI,Capita One Housing,CBL,CCS IT Keystone CCSIT,CEDRM,CHICS,CHR,CIH,CMS,COA,CORE,CPL,CRM,CRM2013,CRS,CTI,CTX,Cadcorp,Capita,CapitaOne,Capita One,Capital Management,Cashflow,Castle,Castleton,Castleton Technology,Cedar Open Accounts,Cerrus,Change,Charges,Chartered Institute Of Housing,Cheaper Housing IT,Chics, Citrix,Civica,Civica CTX,Civica Cx,Civica 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survey,Housing,Housing Contact,Housing Group,Housing Insight,Housing Management,Housing Management Consultant,Housing Partners,Housing Portfolio Management System,Hub Asset Management,Homeswapper,Housing jigsaw, Housing Support Pro,HousingIT,HousingSupportPro,HyperOptic, IMS,IT,IT Budget,IT Training,ITIL,Impact Response,In,In4,In4Systems Promaster,InfoBoss,InHouse,InMotion,InMotion2015,InMotion2016,InfoBoss,Infoflow,Information,Information Technology,Information@Work components,Informix,Innovation, Informetis,Inphase,Inside Housing,Insight,Internet Portal,Internetalia,Invu,Ireland,Irish,itLab, Keyfax,Keylogic,Keypera,Keystone,Kirona,Kypera,Keynamics, Landlord,Ledgers,Linkedin,Liquid,Locality,Localz, M3,MAVIS,MD,MDM,MI,MIS,MIS-AMS,MISCS,MRI,MS Dynamics,MRI,MS Dynamics CRM2011,Microsoft365,microsoft 365,MWL,Management,Management Server,Manifest,Measuring,Mebus,More IQ,MoreIQ,Microsoft Dynamics 365,Microsoft dynamics GP 2013,Miracle,MobileIron,Mobysoft,Monopoly board images and pictures,Montal,Mr Void,MriEngage,MrVoid,MoreIQ NDL,NINTEX,NINTEX workflow,NPS,NPS ASSIST,NPS Housing,NPS Job Manager Mobile,NROSH,Natural,Neighbourhoods and Communities,Nintexworkflow,Northgate,Northgate Codeman,Northgate Public Services,Notice, OA,OGC Buying Solutions,OJEU Limits,ORS,Ohms,OmFax,Omniledger,One,OneAdvanced,OneServe,Open source,OpenContractor,OpenHousing,Opti-time,Options,Optitime,Oracle,Orchard,Outsource and outsourcing,OutSystems, PIMMS,PIMSS Data,PM,PRINCE2,Paloma,Pamwin,PanConnect,People Value,Peoplevalue,PfH,Pick,PlanForm,Planned maintenance,Plenfific,Plus,Portfolio Management System,PowerObjects,Pro,Pro-Points,Prodo,Progress,Promaster,Propoints,Proval,Providers,Pyramid, QL,QLX, QLF, QL Yuneo,QuantSpark,Qube,QLX,Qlikview,QueryView,Queryview reporting,Quiss, RM865,ROCC,RPs,RSL,Rave,ReAct,Reality,RedkiteCRM,Red Olive,Registered,Registered Social,Rent Increase,RentSense,RentSenseLite,Repairfinder,Reporting,Reports,RobotAutomation,Rocket,Rubixx, Salesforce,Salesforce.Org,SAP,SASSHA,SDM,SHBVN,SM,SOTI,SP,SQL,SQL Open Housing,SQL Reporting,SQL Server,Saffron,Safron,Saturn,Scenario,Scotland,Scots,Scottish,Scout,Sequoa,Serengeti,Serros,Server,Service,Services,Servitor,Sharepoint,Sim,SimPro, Simdel,Simdell,Slash and Burn,Social Housing ICT,Social Housing Software Applications,Social Media,Software,Software solutions,Spotlight Service,Spotlightservice,Star rating,Stores and Stock,Strategic,SunAccounts,Sunguard,Surveys,Streetwise, Swordfish,Sx3,Symatrix Human,System alignment,Systems,Systemwise, T-Files,TEAMS,TED,TFiles,TP Tracker,TSG,Tagish Casework,Tagra,Task,TAIM,Technologies (India) PVT Limited,Telecetera,Template,Terminal Services,That,Three Star,Tilt,TiltAffinity,Today,Tony Smith,Tony Smith That Housing IT Guy,TonySmith that housing IT,TonySmithHou,TonySmithHousing, ,TonySmithHousingITguy,Total,Total Mobile,Totalmobile,Trace,Tribal,Twitter, U2,UC,UK,UK Housing,Ukhousing,UniClass Enterprise,Unidata,United Kingdom,Universal,Universalcredit,Universe,Unrest, Valueworks,Van Stock,Vantage,Vantage Sentinel,Version,Virtualisation,Visualmetrics,Voice,Voice and data,Voluntas, Wales,Welsh,Wheatley,Windows Server,Workflow and,Work Hub,Works Connect, XML,Xen App,XenApp,Xmbrace, Yuneo, ...
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