FUJ00142190
FUJ00142190
Fujitsu Services,
22 Baker Street,
London,
W1U 3BW,
08/04/10
Mark Burley,
Post Office Ltd,
2nd Floor
148 Old Street
London
EC1V 9HQ
London,
Dear Mark,
Please find enclosed a statement detailing Fujitsu's position with respect to the Final Balance
Report issue from the HNG-X Pilot. This statement has now been confirmed by our
Commercial, Legal and Programme Leads.
Signed on behalf of Fujitsu Services by,
Alan D'Alvarez
Programme Director,
Royal Mail Group Business Unit
FUJ00142190
FUJ00142190
Background
During Branch Trading Statement (BTS) Production the report is produced twice in the form
of:
e A Trial Report to allow the Postmaster to check that the data is correct.
e A Final Report which is produced after the Trial Report has been confirmed. This
indicates that the Branch has rolled over in the next Trading Period.
The BTS consist of two parts:-
e ASummary of Stock Unit and Suspense Account activities (relating to Cash and Cash
movements) over the Trading Period.
* Consolidated Stock Levels for all Volume Stock Items.
Problem Description
On the Final Report, the Stock Holding figures in the second section of the Report are
incorrect on the final balance.
Points to Note
«The first section of the Final Report (relating to Cash
and Cash movements) is correct.
e The figures that are stored as Opening figures for the
new Trading Period are correct. To expand on this slightly, at the
time the Final BTS Report is produced some Opening Figures for the
Suspense Account are stored back in the BRDB. These figures are
from the first part of the report and so are not corrupted by the
defect and therefore are correct.
e The figures on both sections of the Trial Report, (which
the Postmaster is asked to check) are correct.
Cause
The root cause of the issue is that the code that re-prints the
report makes incorrect use of the cache of data held at the counter
for generating the report as it is printing the report.
To expand on this further:-
1. When the BTS is being produced, it is done based on data written to the Branch
Database (BRDB) whenever a Stock Unit Rolls over.
2. BTS Production retrieves this data from BRDB to the counter.
3. The counter then uses it to generate the Trial BTS.
4. There is a defect in the way that the report is produced such that some of the in-memory
copy of the data is overwritten when the Trial BTS is produced.
Acconsequence of this is that when the final BTS is produced it is using incorrect data.
The problem has been fixed by ensuring that the final BTS uses the
original data retrieved by the counter at step 2 rather than the data left
over after step 4.
7. The problem was first reported by the Warwick Branch when it was pointed out that the
trial Balance figures were correct and the
Final Balance figures were incorrect.
8. Comparing the Trial and Final balance figures with the
corresponding Stock Unit Balance Reports shows easily that the Trial
Balance is correct and the Final Balance is incorrect.
9. None of the incorrect data is stored to BRDB so there is no possibility of
ongoing corruption of stock levels.
Oa
Key Questions
Can Fujitsu provide a complete and comprehensive list of all products where the volumes on
the Final Balance Report differ to those on the Trial Balance Report?
All figures relating to the Volume Stock Holdings can be corrupted by the issue, but not
necessarily all the figures will be incorrect.
How Has the Defect Arisen?
The defect is a software issue that was not detected in application testing by the Joint Test
Team.
What are the Impacts of this Defect — detailing all stock items affected?
All the Volume Stock items in this section of the report could be affected.
What is Fujitsu doing to resolve this defect?
Fujitsu has developed a software fix to resolve the issue by ensuring that the Final Report
uses the original data retrieved by the counter at Step 2 described above rather than using
the data left after Step 4. This is a counter fix that has been signed-off in test as part of the
01.08 Maintenance Release counter fixes and has been deployed to the live HNG-X branches.
For HNG-X migrations in the immediate future, the 01.08 counter fixes are deployed and
committed to the branch 1 working day after HNG-X becomes operational. Before this fix was
available, Fujitsu had written a KEL which includes instructions to the HSD to give advice to
Postmasters. The advice is to use the Trial Report, which is correct. The Final Report is to
be kept but not used.
The 01.08 Counter fixes will be included within the next Counter Migration package, to
remove the need for deploying additional fixes to branches within 24 hours of migrating to
HNG-xX.
Can Fujitsu Provide a Statement Proving the Integrity of the Data is not compromised in any
way, and the only impact is incorrectly reported data?
Fujitsu confirms that this defect relates specifically to the printing of Report data to support the
production of the Office's Branch Trading Statement created immediately following the Offices
migration onto the HNG-X system. This defect results in a discrepancy with the volume data
reported in the Final Balance Report following the printing of the Trial Balance Report, and is
not related in any way to the underlying Branch Data held in the operational HNG-X system.
This in no way compromises the underlying Data held in respect of the individual branch or
the system as a whole.
Can Fujitsu provide a commitment to support POL in proving the integrity of the system in any
subsequent legal action (specifically where the difference in the two reports is used as a
means to challenge the integrity of the system)?
Fujitsu is willing to provide a commitment to assist in trying to prove the integrity of the system
in any subsequent legal action in accordance with the existing contractual arrangements.
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