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Document Storage (Item 21)
Document Storage (Item 21)
TCS’s claim for Snowbound remediation costs relates to TCS adopting a document storage configuration using a file system and not in a database. The Updated Schedule of Loss states, ‘The Defendant is upgrading the Unified Content Manager and datacore components as part of a project to address the poor performance and unreliability of Snowbound on the users of R1 Barring.’ Other than reference back in general terms to ‘poor performance and unreliability’, there is no specific pleaded allegation: taking a broad view of the pleading, the allegation rests on the general case about the failure to have designed the solution in accordance with GIP, resulting in poor performance and unreliability.
There is no independent evidence supporting the claim. Dr Hunt accepts that she has not assessed the configuration independently, and whilst she gave evidence that the CGI proposal (the supplier recommending the proposed change) was ‘a sensible proposal’, Dr Hunt’s evidence falls short of asserting that the configuration adopted by TCS was not in accordance with Good Industry Practice. Moreover, as set out in the passage above, Dr Hunt agreed that there was nothing, in respect of performance and reliability which was ‘primarily’ the fault of HPE, which TCS should have done to improve performance other than upgrade Snowbound.
Furthermore, Mr Konda of TCS explained that it was not possible to use a database storage model given the lack of shared storage in the DXC solution. There is no dispute that TCS agreed to supply the Datacore solution in 2015 pursuant to RFC 423 because of the limitations in HPE’s provision of shared storage. DBS relies upon the fact that under “key features” of RFC 423, TCS was to describe how it had assured itself that “the SCC can deliver the R1 non-functional requirements, in particular the performance levels”. This ignores the fact, however, that the RFC also identifies that a number of alternative options were considered, and then stated:
‘However all options have similar issues related to delivery timeframe, cost and technical risk. The option described in the RFC (2, above) is considered the best compromise of deliverability, cost and technical risk. The only option without technical risk is (3), but that would be very expensive and likely to have a major impact upon the dates.’
Option 3 was stated to be replacing virtual servers, many of which were already built, with 62 servers as these could have shared storage presented to them. Thus, the RFC was clear on its face that the solution being adopted was not as technically optimal as shared storage. There is no evidence that, presented with requirement for a technical solution at the particular time it was required in the project, the recommendation for the solution was wrong or represented a failure of Good Industry Practice (and no such case is pleaded).
I accept, therefore, the evidence of Mr Britton that the upgrades to the UCM or datacore components do not imply any failure on behalf of TCS.
The Counterclaim at item 21 of the Updated Schedule of Loss for £293,069 fails.
- Heading
- CONTENTS
- IntroductiON
- The Factual Witnesses
- Expert Evidence
- Programming Experts
- Forensic Accounts
- The Parties Submissions
- Principles Applicable to Issues of Construction
- The Defendant’s Obligations and Responsibilities
- Clause 15
- Clause 9.5 which states
- Clause 14.5 of Schedule 2-6 which states
- The Delay and Notice Provisions
- Clause 7
- Conditions Precedent: Clauses 5 and 6
- Conditions Precedent: the authorities
- Clause 5.6
- Clause 6
- Clause 8
- Limitations of Liability
- A single or multiple caps?
- The Delay Damages cap under Clause 52.2.5
- Is TCS’s claim for loss of anticipated costs savings excluded by Clause 52?
- Compliance with Clause 5.3, Agreement and Estoppel Introduction
- Express Agreement
- Estoppel
- Introduction
- R1 B&B Delays
- Mr Britton’s First Analysis
- Mr Britton’s Second Analysis
- Conclusion on Mr Britton’s Analyses
- TCS’s submission based upon Mr Jardine’s analysis
- Responsibilities for Delay on the ‘Infrastructure’ Critical Path
- R1-D
- Compliance with Notice Provisions
- Analysis of Delays
- Up to August 2017
- From August 2017 to 19 September 2018
- Analysis
- Failed to confirm its desired functional scope of R1 Disclosure in relation to the Customer-to-Business portal and Accountable Officer’s Update Service functionality. Such confirmation was a prerequis
- Failed to make available an end-to-end test environment for the Interactive Voice Response system
- Failed to agree upon a data migration approach, without which the Claimant could not complete the build of a data migration environment so that anonymised data could be made available for testing
- Failed to ensure that relevant external stakeholders were available to participate in Final Systems Integration Testing
- Partial Termination
- TCS’s Claims
- Non-Manpower Costs
- Anticipated Cost Savings
- Summary of TCS’s Delay Claim Recovery
- DBS’s Claims
- Delay Payments
- R1-B&B Delay
- Disclosure Scotland Extension Costs – Item 1 of the Updated Schedule of Loss
- Loss of Anticipated Savings – Item 3 of the Updated Schedule of Loss
- R1-D Delay
- R0 Licence Costs – Item 4 of the Updated Schedule of Loss
- R0 Hosting and Infrastructure Costs - Item 5 of the Updated Schedule of Loss
- R0 Technology Refresh – Item 6 of the Updated Schedule of Loss
- R0 N-1 Sustainment Costs – Item 7 of the Updated Schedule of Loss
- R0 Maintenance Costs – Item 8 of the Updated Schedule of Loss
- Savings
- Introduction
- Quality-related Obligations
- Good Industry Practice and Defects
- Digital by Default Standards
- Section 71
- The Basics Portal
- Section 73
- The Barring Portal
- Section 75
- Section 76
- Barring Portal: Loss of productivity - Item 11 of the Updated Schedule of Loss
- LPF Portal
- Siebel Useability Issues
- Redaction
- Document naming, bundle creation and performance
- Adobe Licence (Item 20)
- Document Storage (Item 21)
- Other B1 Barring Quality Issues
- Scan on Demand
- Special Characters
- Letters
- Item 24 : Loss of Efficiency Claims arising out of R1 Barring Quality/Useability Issues
- N-1 Sustainment Costs
- Causation and Loss
- Exit/Service Transfer
- Identification of all services (3.2.2)
- Knowledge Transfer (3.2.6 and 3.2.7)
- Section 95
- Providing all documentation to a replacement contractor (3.2.1 and 3.2.10)
- The identification of all leases, maintenance agreement and support agreements in connection with the provision of the services (3.2.3)
- Providing any other information or assistance reasonably required by a replacement contractor (3.2.14)
- Causation and Loss
- The Security Incidents
- The Charges Variation Dispute Introduction
- Issue 1: How the amount of an ‘over-recovery of the Forecast Revenue’ (Clause 2.8.4) or ‘under-recovery of the Forecast Revenue’ (Clause 2.8.5) is to be measured
- Section 104
- Issue 4: How Clause 2.8.5 of Schedule 2-3 applied to Volume Based Service Charges in Service Year 5
- Issue 2: Whether the Predicted Volumes for Basics in Service Year 4 were 1,000,000 (TCS’s case) or 320,374 (DBS’s case)
- Conclusion on Volume Based Service Charge
- Conclusions