TechnologyOne says City of Brisbane ignored its own reviews

Australian ERP software vendor TechnologyOne has escalated a long-running row with Brisbane City Council, threatening to sling an AU$50 million sueball at the city. The $120-million-plus contract at the centre of the dispute is to replace 13 of the council's systems with a single “Local Government Systems” project. When the …

[RudderLessIT]

BCC must be Johnny Diesel fans

...and they would be singing one of his hits a fair bit, right about now...

"Don't you know it's a cryin' shame

When you've got yourself to blame"

[Tim99]

Reinvention?

The $120-million-plus contract at the centre of the dispute is to replace 13 of the council's systems with a single “Local Government Systems” project.

I know that we tend to think that we are special, but similar systems have been done many times - "Buy something that already works".

As an aside: My father was a Senior Local Government Officer - The Treasurer/CFO/Deputy Clerk for a UK rural district council, he put in one of the first "computer systems" in the 1960s to do "the rates" etc. It worked so well the supplier gave them an ANITA Calculator (about 15 weeks wages then) as a "thank you", and used them as a reference site. It was still working well when he grabbed the money and retired when the rolling disaster of the Redcliffe-Maud Commission/Local Government Act was enacted in 1973. He usually preferred to use a manual comptometer instead of the ANITA; but when he retired he gave them £5 for it, and continued to use it for the next 15 years or so.

[Mark 65]

Useless twats meet inept parasites. Match made in heaven. Get the lawyers involved for the gravy train shitfest trifecta.

[Colin Tree]

bump in the road

Oh great, variations, that's where we'll really make some money !!!

" council's business processes are “poorly defined” "

after working alongside BCC workers for many years, I can only agree with that, they should stick to patching potholes (badly), that's about their limit.

[Mellipop]

They're both to blame

Big projects with up-front plans seldom succeed

When will they ever learn?

[aberglas]

How do small councils survive?

Brisbane City Council is several times bigger than smaller regional ones. Yet they both do the same sorts of things and need the same sort of IT support. Rates, dog licenses, capital works projects etc.

And a Rates system that does 1,000,000 residents is no more complex than on that does 10,000 residents so there is a huge economy of scale.

And yet, rates for Brisbane are quite high. And the smaller councils still manage to get things done.

One of the mysteries...

[GrahamK69]

Turn Key Costs

When will the BCC realise that pen pushers are inappropriate to run IT contacts. You need an actual IT professional who has built many systems (Built not designed). That way the vendor flim flam which is often effective against pen pushers is avoided.

Make a turn key contact that has fixed costs through the contact based on accepted goals and sign offs that are paid after customer acceptance. <-- NOTE BCC

I did a huge 55 million dollar contact installing SAP and guess what it was on Budget and early on time as the vendor had a vested interest in getting it done early.