State Information Technology Agency (SITA) has announced adjustments to tariffs it charges for information and communications technology (ICT) services it renders to government departments. The adjustments are with effect from April this year.
In terms of the adjustments, which have been sanctioned by the National Treasury and the Department of Public Service and Administration, tariffs that SITA charges for the Basic Accounting System (BAS) have been capped at a fixed monthly rate.
To reduce IT services costs to government departments, tariffs charged for the IBM hosting services have been cut by 10%, while tariffs for all other hosting services will be increased by 6%, including library services and Financial Management System (FMS).
Meanwhile, labour rates and tariffs have increased by 6%, while the impact on networks will only be where SITA services are contracted on a time and materials basis. The tariffs that SITA charges for Internet services have also been fixed according to the bandwidth utilised by the departments.
When fully deployed, the Government Common Core Network (GCCN) - which replaced Openet in 2002 - will save government departments considerably in costs, and is recommended as the future of government interconnectivity.
SITA has not increased its tariffs for transversal systems for the 2003/4 year, but increased usage and additional functionality on the BAS system has resulted in substantial increases in total costs for most departments.
SITA's Internet technology is benchmarked with UUNet, Internet Solution (Dimension Data Group) as well as AST. The GCCN technology has been benchmarked against Telkom and the PE-Corporation, which has been used as the platform to benchmark labour tariffs.
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