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ho. autt
Tony Oppenheim Zo Office mae \m es
Finance and Commercial! Director WATe 5
ICL Pathway a los BS lesat4
Forest Road 4
Feltham mT) Pa / 5 O08
Middlesex WN } NW I t (\ “as on
TW13 7ES ; I I AAA I WO 1% January 2000
; POH -908D I .
Dear Tony, }
DYg sch de iene e
I have been contacted by Chris Paynter of our audit group over an issue that! ‘Tony
appears to be becoming deadlocked between him and Martyn Bennett. The I
issue relates to access to the transaction audit trail that is maintained by benecnnnnnramnnd
Pathway. I understand the concern to be that while Pathway are co-operating
over “true” audit access, it is being claimed that such provisions do not-extend
to supporting investigations for security purposes. Martyn has also suggested
that if such access were to be granted, then a charge would be levied
POCL Access to Audit Information
I would have expected Pathway to be as concerned as POCL to ensure that
potential misuse of the services are investigated. Neither POCL nor Pathway
would wish to initiate such investigations without due cause (accepting that
they may be time-consuming and distracting for both organisations), but
nevertheless where there are grounds for suspicion, the issue-must be
investigated thoroughly. Without such an investigation we, jointly, could not
be sure that the access controls and integrity of the:Pathway services are not
being breached.
Apart from this practical perspective, I think that denying such access is at
variance with the provisions of the Codified Agreement. Pathway are required
to retain the audit trail for a minimum of 18 months (R699), and longer if
required by POCL in support of investigations or prosecutions (R829) - which
begs the question of how POCL can ask for.a longer retention if they have.not
previously seen what there is to be retained! R816 and its solution confirmed
that the 18 months’ worth of records will be available for retrieval and review.
In terms of supporting investigations I would point to clause 801.3 which
provides (with my emphasis in bold):
Post Office Counters Led
20.23 Greville Sereec
London ECiN 85
cf
801.3 Without prejudice to the foregoing, in the event of an investigation
into suspected fraudulent activity or other impropriety by the Contractor
or any third party POCL reserves for itself, any statutory or regulatory
auditors of POCL and their. respective authorised agents the right of
immediate access to the Records described in Clause 801.1 and Clause 801.2
above and the Contractor agrees to render all necessary assistance to the
conduct of such investigation at all times during the currency of this
Codified Agreement or at any time thereafter.
In terms of levying a. charge for providing such assistance, The provisions of
A03 include (again with my emphasis):
6.2 With respect to Clause 801.3, where the investigations find no
evidence of fraudulent activity or other:impropriety by the Contractor or
the Contractor's agents, then at the discretion of POCL, the Contractor
may be paid reasonable additional charges for its assistance.
This seems clear tome. Pathway should provide access and may be paid for
their assistance.
Can I ask you to consider this and speak to Martyn? If there is a difference
between our interpretations, perhaps we can discuss this-at the next Contract
Administration meeting
Yours sincerely,
Keith Baines
Head of Horizon Commercial
(000000/00000 to_Acess Hiz Dbse_BSM Prbim_10.01.00 GPXB 290699:1017
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