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13 SEP 1999-1131
Electronic memo
To Stuart Sweetman/HO/POCL/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE
ce PONECMirs, Erika Watts/HQ/POCL/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE, Andrew
Radka/POCL/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE, Keith K
Baines/POCL/POSTOFFICE@POSTOFFICE
Hard Copy To
Hard Copy cc
From June Lilley/POCL/POSTOFFICE
Date 10/09/99 16:25
Subject HORIZON ACCEPTANCE
Please see the attached from Dave Miller
Septt0.doc
Thanks
JUNE
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PERSONAL AND IN STRICTEST CONFIDENCE
TO: Stuart Sweetman COPY: PONEC
Bruce McNiven
Keith Baines
Andy Radka
Jeff Triggs
FROM: Dave Miller DATE: 10September 1999
SUBJECT: HORIZON ACCEPTANCE - UPDATE FRIDAY 10 SEPTEMBER @ 10.30
Weare sending separately a full update on Horizon generally to enable you to brief
John Roberts on Monday.
Today Richard Christou and I met as planned to decide whether to roll out a further 2 weeks
offices (350).
Ioutlined the Post Office position as follows (NB - I have put more detail into this note than
was discussed with Christou). S
1 Very considerable progress has been made in the joint workshops with ICL Pathway
butas of today there were still 2 high incidents (Data integrity across the TIP
interface and system stability around screen freezes) which would, in the Post Office
view, make it difficult to accept on 24 September.
2. These two incidents have rectification plans parts of which will take up until
Christmas to complete e.g. the data integrity control necessary to satisfy the auditors
won't be ready until early December and we will have to continue our checking until
then.
3. Because of the degree of exposure before Christmas we have concerns a) about the
number of offices to be installed before Christmas and b) that we have a firebreak of
suitable length around Christmas in order to establish that ICL Pathway rectification
plans have worked and that essential PO support areas like TP have sufficient time to
clear the decks before National Rollout starts in earnest in January 2000.
4, Therefore if we were to stick rigorously to our agreed process I would not be
allowing further rollout.
5. However repeated disruptions of the rollout process were not easy to handle froma
logistics point of view (long lead times etc.) and the net result of stopping the 350
could be that we delayed any further rollout until after Christmas.
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6. This was not to the advantage of either party and we proposed for in principle
consideration another way ahead. This was that:
i) we reduce the number of offices to be installed before Christmas
ii) that we make resumption of rollout after Christmas conditional on ICL
Pathway having successfully completed all rectification plans (Note : we need
to be very specific about how we would judge successful completion). Any
delay to be at ICL Pathway costs (- ours and theirs).
iii) that ICL Pathway would compensate POCL for having to run an integrity
control over the TIP interface until their solution became available on
December 8.
iv) that ICL should indemnity the Post Office against all claims relating to data
integrity whilst (iii) above was in place.
Christou clarified that he would still get his £68m on acceptance and asked if he could have
some easement around his first £90m rollout payment which would under these proposals,
slip until after Christmas. He was suggesting a payment pro-rata to the number of offices
completed by Christmas. .
lindicated that such matters would need to be part of a more detailed negotiations.
Christou indicated that he regarded these proposals as helpful and we agreed in principle to
negotiate on that basis.
We agreed that the negotiations should take place early next week. (NB to Keith Baines and
Jeff Triggs - Tuesday is my strongly preferred date).
DAVE MILLER