interestrateripoff Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-14314935 Government departments have been ripped off by a "cartel" of big IT firms, a damning report by a committee of MPs has found.Some were paying as much as 10 times the commercial rate for equipment and up to £3,500 for a single desktop PC. The public administration committee said an "obscene amount of public money" was being wasted on IT. The government said it was already making "significant improvements" to the way it bought computer equipment. Now I'd like to know what was bought and what where the specs, if this was a high end PC then maybe it's not really a story? http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2019458/How-Whitehall-pays-3-500-250-obscene-waste-public-money.html The report cites some Whitehall departments who blow an average of £3,500 on a desktop computer, while they can be bought for as little as £250 on the High Street, 14 times cheaper. The Wail take, although I'd like to know if the £250pc is the same spec as the £3500 one. More information is needed to know how badly the taxpayer is being ripped off. Although when it's not your money people don't tend to seek value and then you have the problem of competitive tendering which stops people just looking for best value. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bloo Loo Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 http://www.bbc.co.uk...litics-14314935 Now I'd like to know what was bought and what where the specs, if this was a high end PC then maybe it's not really a story? http://www.dailymail...blic-money.html The Wail take, although I'd like to know if the £250pc is the same spec as the £3500 one. More information is needed to know how badly the taxpayer is being ripped off. Although when it's not your money people don't tend to seek value and then you have the problem of competitive tendering which stops people just looking for best value. £3500 is the average. then there is the ipad, the smart phone, the electric pencil sharpener..... And costs will include installation, security, procurement and tendering costs, network installations, the 12 year warranty, and ergonomic desketry. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gone baby gone Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 And costs will include installation, security, procurement and tendering costs, network installations, the 12 year warranty, and ergonomic desketry. This. £3,500 most likely includes all of the above. The £250 desktop does not. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bloo Loo Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 This. £3,500 most likely includes all of the above. The £250 desktop does not. nonsense, DULL computers say you get everything you need for £250. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
winkie Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 You should see what they pay for the photocopy paper....and they never use double sided. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. Miyagi Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 Now I'd like to know what was bought and what where the specs, if this was a high end PC then maybe it's not really a story? Crisis 2 lan party? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pablopatito Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 At my wife's civil service office Fujitsu are currently in the process of rolling out Microsoft Vista on their existing ten year old PCs. This seems crazy. Meanwhile, on the continent, the public sector are involved in massive Linux based implementations. The government seem confused. They employed Philip Green to tell them that centralised purchasing cuts costs but at the same time are saying they want to phase out centralised purchasing. Logically, surely, if you give me a £100 million then I'm going to get a much better deal when I go and negotiate with Microsoft and Dell than if you give a thousand people £100 grand and tell them to negotiate with PC World. That's just common sense. If its not working then sack the purchasing managers, don't change the system. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Masked Tulip Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 A Technical Architect can earn 400 to 600 per day working for one of the big IT consultancies but will be hired out by that IT Consultancy for 2,000 to 3,000 per day to the public sector organisation. If the TA tried to work direct for the public sector he/she would find it impossible. The public sector procurement process is hugely flawed and biased towards the big firms. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bloo Loo Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 A Technical Architect can earn 400 to 600 per day working for one of the big IT consultancies but will be hired out by that IT Consultancy for 2,000 to 3,000 per day to the public sector organisation. If the TA tried to work direct for the public sector he/she would find it impossible. The public sector procurement process is hugely flawed and biased towards the big firms. what has a technical architect to do with installing a PC? Indeed, what is a Technical Architect? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
(Blizzard) Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 Large corporations pay similar rates. 'You see sir, our server comes with special healing energy crystals which will increase corporate throughput by 38%. If you don't have the crystals then you'll be infested with hackers and the millenium bug.' Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fluffy666 Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 A Technical Architect can earn 400 to 600 per day working for one of the big IT consultancies but will be hired out by that IT Consultancy for 2,000 to 3,000 per day to the public sector organisation. If the TA tried to work direct for the public sector he/she would find it impossible. The public sector procurement process is hugely flawed and biased towards the big firms. There is a huge case for the UK having public sector IT development and implementation centers with developers et al directly employed full time. And based in the regions to keep costs down. This would make the budget controllable; it would also mean that when things went wrong, you'd be able to find the people who got it wrong. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
winkie Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 Large corporations pay similar rates. 'You see sir, our server comes with special healing energy crystals which will increase corporate throughput by 38%. If you don't have the crystals then you'll be infested with hackers and the millenium bug.' We don't want that now do we.....whatever it costs add it to the bill. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lfc2005 Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 £3500 for a desktop sounds cheap. When I was working for the MoD a while back the DII programme that they were working towards was going to charge them £4000 per user..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Masked Tulip Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 what has a technical architect to do with installing a PC? Indeed, what is a Technical Architect? I have no idea. I must take it off my CV. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
winkie Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 £3500 for a desktop sounds cheap. When I was working for the MoD a while back the DII programme that they were working towards was going to charge them £4000 per user..... Ever felt like you were in the wrong business? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Inside Man Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 A Technical Architect can earn 400 to 600 per day working for one of the big IT consultancies but will be hired out by that IT Consultancy for 2,000 to 3,000 per day to the public sector organisation. If the TA tried to work direct for the public sector he/she would find it impossible. The public sector procurement process is hugely flawed and biased towards the big firms. Sorry, that's twaddle. The office of government commerce (OGC) agreed rates with the IT vendors for the provision of different grades of staff, including architects. This comes under a contractual framework called Catalyst. Catalyst rates for a typical architect are around 750 pounds a day. The fully loaded cost to the consultancies for this person is about 500 a day, either contract or permanent, so the margins are not as massive as people think. When you then take into account the risk that the businesses are taking, and the costs of bids/proposals/management overheads, government contracts are typically not that profitable.... unless you can get a large one. The OGC and Whitehall are pushing back against these, so they are likely to find themselves in a position where they get "no bid" responses to a lot of small unprofitable pieces of work soon. For us, I'd rather put people into Banking/Telco/Media/Utility jobs where we can make a far better margin. Government contracts are very hard and expensive to win, soak up resources and make feeble margins. I left banking to run a technical consultancy for a big-4 firm so I'm painfully aware of this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lfc2005 Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 £3500 for a desktop sounds cheap. When I was working for the MoD a while back the DII programme that they were working towards was going to charge them £4000 per user..... I'm pretty sure that was an annual cost also. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
winkie Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 Sorry, that's twaddle. The office of government commerce (OGC) agreed rates with the IT vendors for the provision of different grades of staff, including architects. This comes under a contractual framework called Catalyst. Catalyst rates for a typical architect are around 750 pounds a day. The fully loaded cost to the consultancies for this person is about 500 a day, either contract or permanent, so the margins are not as massive as people think. When you then take into account the risk that the businesses are taking, and the costs of bids/proposals/management overheads, government contracts are typically not that profitable.... unless you can get a large one. The OGC and Whitehall are pushing back against these, so they are likely to find themselves in a position where they get "no bid" responses to a lot of small unprofitable pieces of work soon. For us, I'd rather put people into Banking/Telco/Media/Utility jobs where we can make a far better margin. Government contracts are very hard and expensive to win, soak up resources and make feeble margins. I left banking to run a technical consultancy for a big-4 firm so I'm painfully aware of this. But is that not what Mr C said 'we are all in this together'?.... the private sector and the public sector feed off each other. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bloo Loo Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 Sorry, that's twaddle. The office of government commerce (OGC) agreed rates with the IT vendors for the provision of different grades of staff, including architects. This comes under a contractual framework called Catalyst. Catalyst rates for a typical architect are around 750 pounds a day. The fully loaded cost to the consultancies for this person is about 500 a day, either contract or permanent, so the margins are not as massive as people think. When you then take into account the risk that the businesses are taking, and the costs of bids/proposals/management overheads, government contracts are typically not that profitable.... unless you can get a large one. The OGC and Whitehall are pushing back against these, so they are likely to find themselves in a position where they get "no bid" responses to a lot of small unprofitable pieces of work soon. For us, I'd rather put people into Banking/Telco/Media/Utility jobs where we can make a far better margin. Government contracts are very hard and expensive to win, soak up resources and make feeble margins. I left banking to run a technical consultancy for a big-4 firm so I'm painfully aware of this. here is a job description for a Technical Architect. As a technical architect you have an important role as the project manager overseeing various IT assignments that are aimed at improving a business. It's your responsibility to make sure that all strands of the project run smoothly and come together as planned at the end when the project goes live. The kinds of projects you might oversee could range from planning the structure of a large-scale patients records database for the NHS to the redesign of a shop's online shopping site. You'll spend a lot of time liaising with people from all backgrounds - from management to designers and programmers in the IT department - to make sure the project meets the needs of the organisation and the people who are going to use the new system. You'll most likely be employed by an IT firm which specialises in the delivery of these kinds of projects to clients, or in-house at a large organisation which has its own team. Depending on your seniority you'll either oversee one part of a system's framework or you could be in charge of the whole thing. Your role will therefore vary from project to project but the core set of tasks you'll cover include: Identifying the organisation's needs Breaking down large scale projects into manageable chunks Working out which IT products to use based on cost benefit analysis and research Agree plans with the client Explain to designers and developers what is required and overseeing the progress Producing documents that monitor progress and ensure the quality of the project Advise the client on managing future It needs Sounds to me this guy should be working FOR THE CLIENT....not the contractor... If he works for the contractor, and the Government org has none, then no wonder the projects fail. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
R K Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 Sorry, that's twaddle. The office of government commerce (OGC) agreed rates with the IT vendors for the provision of different grades of staff, including architects. This comes under a contractual framework called Catalyst. Catalyst rates for a typical architect are around 750 pounds a day. The fully loaded cost to the consultancies for this person is about 500 a day, either contract or permanent, so the margins are not as massive as people think. When you then take into account the risk that the businesses are taking, and the costs of bids/proposals/management overheads, government contracts are typically not that profitable.... unless you can get a large one. The OGC and Whitehall are pushing back against these, so they are likely to find themselves in a position where they get "no bid" responses to a lot of small unprofitable pieces of work soon. For us, I'd rather put people into Banking/Telco/Media/Utility jobs where we can make a far better margin. Government contracts are very hard and expensive to win, soak up resources and make feeble margins. I left banking to run a technical consultancy for a big-4 firm so I'm painfully aware of this. Banks are state owned/funded; Telco's are and utilities are an effective oligopoly and media - well we've seen what media is. Big-4 firm. Whole private sector needs a good shakedown - at an 80% discount. Get off everyone's backs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
A.steve Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 £3500 for a desktop sounds cheap. It all depends what the requirements were. If the requirement was "Deliver me any functional PC and leave it there for me to deal with" - then it's expensive. Adjusted for inflation, I've spent more on a single PC's hardware - and I spent a month scouring price-lists to buy every component from the most competitive vendor! The key questions that need to be raised are: What was the specification that was mandated? Who was responsible for that? Where's the evidence of price-discovery? Where's the evidence that the specification was questioned when the price fell outside expected bounds? My suspicion is that the requirements asked for features that either do not exist, or are provably impossible to supply... so... the supplier has been forced to take whatever action they see fit to avoid a claim that they failed to supply being upheld... and the costs for this are passed on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Inside Man Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 Banks are state owned/funded; Telco's are and utilities are an effective oligopoly and media - well we've seen what media is. Big-4 firm. Whole private sector needs a good shakedown - at an 80% discount. Get off everyone's backs. Problem is, the private sector generates money and contributes to GDP. Public sector soaks it up and spends it. You might not agree with the state of the world, and how things are run, but the profit motive does tend to keep people in jobs that they pay taxes on so the public sector can be funded. I guess posting on here that I work for a big-4 fim as akin to saying I'm a banker. Again, you might not like the description but it's a statement of fact rather than opinion or boast. I'll keep my head down... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Downside Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 I did an apprenticeship with a local council about 5 years ago and the waste that goes on is staggering. You would get people who would have a desktop pc, a laptop and a tablet PC all at the same time. For one person they ordered this really expensive specialist equipment as the person had eye sight problems and when I checked the PC the last person to have logged in was the previous apprentice who left 2 years prior! They were also on some contract with Dell so got brand new replacement PC's every 3 years at about £400 for each unit. Every private sector place i've worked at the PC's have been about 5 to 7 years old and still going. I think one of the reasons they ordered all this unnecessary equipment is because if they didn't spend their entire budget for that year then it would be reduced the next so every April we would get an order for some expensive equipment that they don't really need just so they use all their budget up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RJG18 Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 I've experienced a case where a local government office paid £4000 to their private-sector service provider to have a desktop PC moved two spaces along a row of desks (about 3 metres). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
easy2012 Posted July 28, 2011 Share Posted July 28, 2011 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-14314935 The Wail take, although I'd like to know if the £250pc is the same spec as the £3500 one. More information is needed to know how badly the taxpayer is being ripped off. Although when it's not your money people don't tend to seek value and then you have the problem of competitive tendering which stops people just looking for best value. Still over inflated of course but those PC are likely to come with a host of expensive softwares. MS Office maybe £400, Some Citrix type of tools, AntiVirus, encryption software, smartcard readers etc. Think the cost is closer to £1k probably. Of course - why they don't start deploying Linux is the big question here... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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