RAF?
Well, unlike the RN, RAF still has planes... so it might be a good^H^H^H^H^Hbetter idea. *grumble, grumble...*
Capita’s disastrous Recruiting Partnership Project with the UK Ministry of Defence is so bug ridden that the Royal Air Force stopped taking on new recruits except for those in “priority roles”. As revealed by The Register last week, Capita’s crappy DRS system, as foisted on the Armed Forces for managing recruitment, has failed …
Honestly, I don't know why Her Majesty's Cretins-in-Power continue to give these clowns anything more important or complicated than getting dressed. Well, actually, I can probably guess, and it'll involve the phrase 'non-executive directorship'. The fact that Crapita could burn water if left unsupervised is entirely irrelevant, as we can't all live on a civil service pension, what?
There's a more subtle problem with the loss of traditional recruiting offices: historically they were the first line of screening. Senior reserve or approaching retirement NCOs would act as encouragers, or discouragers, depending on judgement, for those who came in.
"Capita’s crappy DRS system, as foisted on the Armed Forces for managing recruitment, has failed to the point that recruits are almost unable to sign up online."
Unable to sign up online? Is that a bad thing? Is an online signup binding?
I mean it's not like you're putting your name down for a bit of weekend night shift work at Asda.
'Ok Lotaresco, please elaborate on your 'yes' to my question "Is that a bad thing?"'
The primary function of the system is to attract potential recruits and to let them sign up on line. At the risk of stating the obvious if they can't sign up on line it rather defeats the purpose of the system, doesn't it? This is a bad thing.
How happy would you feel with an on line banking system which required you to wet sign a cheque and pop it in the post at the end of the process?
How happy would you feel with an on line banking system which required you to wet sign a cheque and pop it in the post at the end of the process?
You use the same online bank as me? Who'd have thought...
Seriously though, I do genuinely come across this level of stupid on occasion.
"You use the same online bank as me? Who'd have thought..."
:-)
It does sound a lot like the Santander on line banking system. Although that's more famous for accepting a transaction then having their on line security dorks cancel the whole thing because the transaction that you made from the mobile app was selected for confirmation by "Security" they rang your home phone number and no one answered so they cancelled the transaction. This means "Big Dave" the plumber thinks that you tried to shaft him and he wants your blood. "Security" can't understand how you managed to access on line banking when you weren't at home. They also refuse to phone the mobile number that you do all your banking from because "That would be insecure."
WTAF?
"They also refuse to phone the mobile number that you do all your banking from because "That would be insecure.""
As much as I hate finding myself in the position of defending Shitandar... they'll ring whatever number you tell them to ring. in my case, they always ring my mobile.
Their security process is a bit shit though... a computer asking you if you know about these " 5 transactions y/n ?"
Although it does offer three dob's and ask me to indicate the correct one which I think is a much better way of confirming security than the normal methods
"As much as I hate finding myself in the position of defending Shitandar... they'll ring whatever number you tell them to ring. in my case, they always ring my mobile."
In a process that requires you to know in advance that a company that takes your mobile phone number as part of its registration process to use online banking as well as your home phone number has a completely separate process that they don't tell you about to get your mobile phone number registered as the number for "Security" to contact. The only time you find this out is when the morons stop a transaction.
No other bank does it this way. They all have a fairly clear process that is clearly explained and most of them have some form of two-factor authentication. Only Santander has a hair-trigger security process that is designed to stop customers spending their own money.
Capita took over and since that day they have been clowns, with big clown shoes, tap dancing in a minefield.
Would that that was true. If it was some of the mines might actually have gone off and taught Capita a well - deserved lesson.
As things stand it seems that no matter how badly they screw things up in whatever "discipline" they touch they are awarded more and more of our money to cover even more activities. It's high time they were penalised - properly - for getting things so wrong.
"Would that that was true. If it was some of the mines might actually have gone off and taught Capita a well - deserved lesson."
Remember it all takes time. EDS were in charge of the contract back in 2008 and were pilloried over the loss of "a laptop" from a recruiter's car and subsequently a hard drive from EDS premises. Eventually EDS's share price collapsed allowing HP to buy them out. It was a long time from EDS taking over the contract to the inevitable pigeon-roosting. Even then I have some sympathy that despite deserving their fate that they seemed to be made the scapegoat for MOD's foul-ups.
HP then had the task of running the contract, but it was mostly a re-branding exercise. HP became much more security conscious and, as far as I can tell as an outside observer, fell foul of MOD because HP wanted to do things right and MOD wanted to do things cheap. OK HP aren't known for undercharging so they probably wanted £s meeelions for simple config changes, as they always do, but I was aware at the time of HP trying to get the security right and recruiting some very good people.
Then came the end of contract and HP were dropped from the running. I suspect that was their clown-shoe to mine interface moment. Crapita how have it, and the things I've heard suggest that it's all going as well as anything Crapita goes. That to me means that their moment will come, but the moments never come quickly and often those paying the price are not those who made the bad decisions.
In other areas the chain of bottom kicking becomes circular. There's a major MOD programme that was EDS, then HP then was given to CSC, which is now DXC with staff at CSC who were TUPE'd from HP to CSC and other staff who were originally HP, stayed with HP when HP lost the contract and are now back on the programme because they are now DXC. But don't worry that bad old EDS that caused the problems is long gone and buried, except that the vast majority of staff on the programme all have EDS on their CV. Sir Humphrey is alive and well in Whitehall.
Well the MOD needs to reduce costs, so reducing head count is required. Since sacking people would be a bad political headline, do it from the other end - just dont hire new people. But how to do that without risking a backlash - Easy! Hire Crapita, let them destroy the recruiting system, and let them continue to run the now non-functioning System for the next 5 years and boom, your head count is reduced and all the blame falls on Crapita!
All part of the plan...
Is that the biggest single group of useless ba***ds in the whole of the UK Civil Service?
Seriously, they already had a working system and staff to study and ask for improvements and corrections from
And "multiple interfaces." I'd guess that's pretty much every HMG stovepiped system feeding every other stovepiped system.
Is that the biggest single group of useless ba***ds in the whole of the UK Civil Service?
MoD and "Defence Equipment & Support" are clearly world leaders in failure, waste, incompetence, and not taking responsibility (FWINtr). Barely a week goes by without an update on yet another vast MoD screwup. But don't forget that those Civil Service core values of FWINtr are cultural, and actively promoted through the entire sorry organisation, looking at the persistent failures of projects at the Home Office, DoH, DWP, MoJ, DfT, Defra and others. Quite laughable to read the official Mission of the Civil Service: "The mission of the Civil Service is the achievement of an excellent service for Government and the other institutions of State as well as for the public as citizens and users of public services, based on principles of integrity, impartiality, effectiveness, equity and accountability."
An evidence based Mission of the Civil Service would read something like this: The mission of the Civil Service is the achievement of epic waste for Government and the other institutions of State as well as for the public as citizens and users of public services, based on principles of incompetence, insularity, ineffectiveness, denial and unaccountability.
One of my favorite lines on recruitment comes from Hugh Grant's character in "An Awfully Big Adventure." I know, not usually known for his profound remarks on the human condition but...
"We scoured the lengths and breadths of the (acting) profession and you were the very best available"
Three seconds pause while the cast feel a healthy glow of self validation and esprit-de-corps
"For the money."
I often wonder how many problems of the UK CIvil Service are down to "If you pay peanuts...."
I often wonder how many problems of the UK CIvil Service are down to "If you pay peanuts...."
Surprisingly few. Most of the problems are down to the culture of the civil service itself, which is about avoiding all personal decisions, evading any responsibility after the event, and deferring anything that can be deferred. The UK Civil Service has evolved to be an art form in work avoidance.
I was briefly a civil servant and hated the organisation, and my partner is now a civil servant, and now she hates the civil service.
Capita is rightly getting a lot of flak for this, but is should be noted that they themselves outsourced the management of the project to Hunter Macdonald, whose HQ is in Reading, just round the corner from where this debacle was developed.
Curiously there is no mention anywhere of Capita or DRS on the Hunter Macdonald website.
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Around 200 full-time reservists are being laid off in January to make way for outsourced civilians employed by Capita, The Sun reported in October. One told the paper: “When a potential applicant asks what it’s like in the Army, the civilian recruiters won’t have a clue.”
So Capita make a massive mess of your recruitment system and you think it's still wise to outsource jobs to the same company.
I do actually agree with the point raised, how is a outsourced recruiter going to be able to best advise someone looking into a career in the forces?
Will these Capita recruiters be getting commission?
The MoD told El Reg that “a short term drop in numbers was expected as the new system is bedding in” and that the Armed Forces “continue to manage and support an active pipeline of candidates.”
Another head in the sand statement from the MoD.
The MoD told El Reg that “a short term drop in numbers was expected as the new system is bedding in” and that the Armed Forces “continue to manage and support an active pipeline of candidates.”
Another head in the sand statement from the MoD.
Is this the same MOD that is failing to achieve its brilliant plan to replace full time military personnel with thousands of reservists and weekend warriors?
So now Tri-Service Defence Recruiting System (DRS) is fully controlled by Capita, despite them having delivered neither the site nor the user role capability that they promised.
We also have Sopra (Hy)Steria manipulating managing the logistics system, not just for the Army but for all three services’ as a "separate stores management systems with a single inventory management information system capability" .. which I am so sure works perfectly ok.
Oh, and by the way: the NHS login system, also managed by Capita has not been updated since 2007 from .NET 1.1 - looking forward to seeing that one in the press soon.
...our local council use Crapita to process online payments for various things from council taxes to paying for a recycling bin for garden waste. It was on the latter that tit ook me more than a few seconds when being sent to the card payment site that the big graphics of card types wasn't just a "we accept the following" type of thing but was waiting for me to tell it which type of card I was planning to use by clicking on the right one.
Notwithstanding that most places seem to be able to work this out automatically from the card number, there was nothing at all to indicate you were supposed to do this.
Notwithstanding that most places seem to be able to work this out automatically from the card number, there was nothing at all to indicate you were supposed to do this.
Yes, the first two digits... If you say "37..." I say "American Express". "60" = Discover Card, "4" = Visa, etc.
Oh, and don't you love "discoverable" interfaces? I always delight in discovering an optimum experience