Oz police IT projects “disastrous”

Large taxpayer-funded IT deals and projects should have an independent assessor tracking their progress to avoid disasters such as Victoria Police's $120 million "wastage", says The Australian.

Last week, Victoria Police's former manager of strategy and business relationships, Richard Kennedy, made sensational claims that the force had been "systematically milked" by outsourcing partner IBM for years before action was taken.

"Hundreds of millions of dollars were lost, and the Ombudsman, chief commissioner Christine Nixon and the auditor-general were repeatedly warned," said Kennedy. "The whole thing is just an unbelievable disaster."

The UK's leading organisations report that their satisfaction with the performance of IT service providers has increased to record levels this year, as has their ability to manage their outsourcing contracts, according to Consultant News.

These findings are from this year's 'information technology outsourcing (ITO) service provider performance and satisfaction study', undertaken by business advisory firm EquaTerra.

UK ITO buyer organisations ranked Capgemini (79%), Cognizant (79%) and Computacenter (78%) as the top three service providers for client satisfaction scores in this year's study and the bottom three were HP/EDS (59%), Verizon Business (58%) and CSC (51%).

Three-quarters of businesses surveyed by BDO are unaware that cost-cutting moves such as outsourcing has increased the risk of being drawn into legal battles, reports Accountancy Age.

Nearly 80% of UK CEOs and FDs polled also believed the recession had increased the number of risks that their business faced and more than 50% of them have sought to reduce costs or share financial risk since the beginning of 2008, the firm found.

The survey, commissioned by the BDO's forensic accounting team, found companies have looked to reduce costs by using more subcontractors and freelancers, by outsourcing activities such as support services or relocating facilities offshore and granting product licences.