agreement). Fiserv had contractual relationships with both EDS (for solution delivery including the BoQ modifications) and BoQ (for licensing and maintenance).
The BOQ decision and implementation project had huge time pressures placed upon it and all growth plans were effectively stalled until the new system was live.
The 17 month core banking implementation was part of an enterprise renewal strategy across business, SME and retail banking. This also included the replacement of old 'small screen' Fujitsu ATMs, the internet banking system and around 100 other applications that had to be integrated with the Fiserv system. However, it was the organisational and staff-related aspects of the project that caused the greatest concerns including: procedural and process changes; the associated training and practice required (BoQ changed more than 97 per cent of processes); day one support; and issue identification and confirmation. Complexities in clearing stream processing and internet banking also required additional focus.
The implementation plan included five data conversions before going live, increasing the bank's confidence in terms of cut-over timing (within a weekend) and its staff's ability to handle go live responsibilities under time pressure (three were full dress rehearsals).
With a pressing schedule, integration and functionality testing commenced immediately on Fiserv base code and was extended to include modifications as they were delivered throughout the project. Test scripts were developed and test harnesses were built to enable the generation of transaction loads extrapolated from existing customer and transaction activity levels. According to the bank, this 'provided a view of where the end-to-end system was likely to experience bottlenecks or limitations'.
'We would have liked to have taken more time with more staff involved in the implementation but the strategic timetable ultimately drove what could and couldn't be done,' said Blacklaw. 'In hindsight the timetable should be set when knowledge is most perfect, there should be greater and broader dedicated user involvement and system-based training management based on actuality.'
