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NatWest sacked 1,800 highly-trained UK staff, the last having left a few weeks ago. NatWest now has virtually no staff who understand how its banking systems work in the UK or employed by it. All the 'work' and 'testing' is now carried out by 800 'contractors' in India. The replacements have demonstrated they do not have a clue what they are doing.
Who, out of the senior management who signed this off, who thought 'IT is not at the heart of what we do, let's outsource it', who decided 'these guys in India know what they are doing' is going to take responsibility for this fiasco?
If you're a customer, these are the two questions you need answered next week:
1. Are you going bring the design and maintenance of your IT infrastructure back to the UK and under your control?
2. Has Susan Allen, Director, Change and Business Services, responsible for 'Transformation Programme across the Retail Division encompassing all channels and functions. Establish Lean capability. Ensure services provided by Business Services (IT, Ops, Property) support delivery of the objectives of the RBS UK Retail, Wealth and Ulster businesses' resigned yet?
If the answer to either question is no, move your accounts to another bank next week. If you can, if the systems are working again before the next IT disaster.
PS The problem was caused by a botched 'upgrade' to the CA7 batch scheduling suite and the loss of the schedule. There is, of course, no RBS employee left in the UK who understands this any longer.
This was the posting I've found with the most insight. I worked at RBS GBM, and I don't doubt a word he says.
The mention of CA Unicenter set alarm bells ringing here. I haven't touched any Computer Associates products for many years but when I did they never solved bug reports, so you needed to know each product's "little foibles" and how to deal with them. That kind of knowledge is what gets lost when you get riid of the experienced folks.
Behold the warranty -- the bold print giveth and the fine print taketh away.
RBS used to hire big in Edinburgh, now nothing really, never had even a bite at one of their roles, never seen one advertised. When they shifted all the other financials shifted in that area not long after. Sad really.
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