Cost of BSF ICT

[Grommit]

This is from a friend of mine who has a friend who is a Network Manager... he was being TUPED as a Technician.... but this was the early days of BSF and schools were able to get out of Managed Services Contracts..

 

 

"A school close to me has taken their ICT out of the managed service.

 

They had a site manager working on site for the Managed Service Company. Any IT requests had to come in writting to him from the headteacher, they where then sent to the PFL's head office to see if was a chargable request. Once confirmation of charge or no charge was agreed the PFL scheduled their IT tech to do the job. If it was a chargable request the Head had to agree to the cost and fax a purchase order over to the PFL's head office, who them scheduled the job.

 

Think 3 weeks to move or install printers.

 

A two pence piece in a floppy drive was counted as vandalism and the drive replaced, even if the drive worked after the coin was removed. 10 minute job £65 charge. Replacing 15 in August soon mounts up

[localzuk]

Sounds like a nice money spinner for the company, and a way to ruin ICT provision in a school.

[Heebeejeebee]

Sounds like a nice money spinner for the company, and a way to ruin ICT provision in a school.

 

... and they won't realise until it's too late.

 

HBJB

[localzuk]

... and they won't realise until it's too late.

 

HBJB

 

Oh, I think they realise it alright. It's just that the government over here looks out for businesses rather than the people themselves. Or am I being too sceptical?

[torledo]

This is from a friend of mine who has a friend who is a Network Manager... he was being TUPED as a Technician.... but this was the early days of BSF and schools were able to get out of Managed Services Contracts..

 

 

"A school close to me has taken their ICT out of the managed service.

 

They had a site manager working on site for the Managed Service Company. Any IT requests had to come in writting to him from the headteacher, they where then sent to the PFL's head office to see if was a chargable request. Once confirmation of charge or no charge was agreed the PFL scheduled their IT tech to do the job. If it was a chargable request the Head had to agree to the cost and fax a purchase order over to the PFL's head office, who them scheduled the job.

 

Think 3 weeks to move or install printers.

 

A two pence piece in a floppy drive was counted as vandalism and the drive replaced, even if the drive worked after the coin was removed. 10 minute job £65 charge. Replacing 15 in August soon mounts up

 

now that's a lot of red tape.

 

unfortunately it seems to be a symptom of 'customer service' in the uk today. Management consultants get paid a LOT of money for devising these hair brained processes, all in the name of 'efficiency'. The less you have to rely on a convaluted process such as this the better. You know that it exists but you can just ignore it - unfortunately this doesn't appear to be the case in this instance.

 

btw you'll see examples of the 65 quid replacement in a lot of big orgs who've outsourced services. For instance, companies who maintain council houding stock charging 100 pounds for replacing a lightbulb on a weekday evening, you hear these stories all the time. It's only when they appear in the paper that the bigwigs realise it's a problem. There's nothing like a bid of bad publicity to get their attention.

Edited February 16, 2008 by torledo

[broc]

I went for an interview a few years ago at a nearby PFI school;

 

I was told some interesting tales....

 

If the NM wanted to gain access to a network cabinet, he had to ask the PFI site manager to send someone to open the room for him.....

 

The same school was built with a server room which also contained their telephone exchange. it had one double 13A power socket to power all their servers & the phone exchange. One day when they plugged in another server it all went very quiet ......

 

If staff want to hold a meeting that extends beyond 4pm they have to pay for the use of the room..... and the projector costs extra....

[AndyF]

Ok guys here's my take on that ..

 

The people who wrote the contract clearly did not think it through. Most BSFs now will have a threshold - small works order - or something like that. This would allow simple, small things to be carried out easily. It is in no ones interest - incluidng the ICT provider - to have loads of paperwork - remember one of the main KPIs is customer satisfaction.

 

Also, one of the later posts mentioned a PFI contractor. I think it is becoming clear that BSF s producing much better solutions than some PFIs. I know of two schools where the BSF contractor has actually taken over from PFI and made huge improvements in the ICT - including ensuring that simple things like the Wireless Acces Points were placed the right way up!!

 

The key to success is to engage early on in the procurement process and get thngs clear about how the school wants to work whilst there s some competitiv pressure on the BSF bidders.