Everyone I speak today about XchangeIT seems happy today. The invoices are coming through although I know Friday is not much of a test. Now I am happy to report that “All is quiet on the Western Front” although we need to wait till Monday to be sure.
I just want to make a note to say that I deny all responsibility for this mess. In my view, XchangeIT was only initially beta tested. In that, it worked well. The problems that occurred had nothing to do with this beta testing. During the Beta testing, the invoices from all suppliers were sent on time, all the invoices were correct and none were blanks. We tested these invoices thoroughly on both posbrowser and DOS and all worked fine. See Lyle comment from Lucky Charm Victoria Point who was among the very first testers.
What happened from there is we requested a pause so only a few sites would have it while they use it we could see what was happening. Then gradually spread it to all users. If this had happened, only a few people would be affected at any time. As there was nothing wrong with the old system and many people were happy to stay on it, there was no rush. So we opposed moving to a mass deployment.
I think the problem occurred in the mass deployment. It appears there was little if any testing for a mass placement. Plus there was no additional support staff put on the suppliers’ side for this deployment something always required if changes are done. Finally, there was also no contingency plan, if something went wrong.
When it started to go wrong misleading information was sent on the 28/Aug/09, on the 31/Aug/09 and 01/Sep/09 and from then on complete silence was broken only by one email seeking details of the current problems. All this made it worse as newsagents believing these messages kept ringing up saying something like “I was told it is fixed but somehow I am having trouble?”
The problem was made worse because so many people rung the support lines about XchangeIT that they clogged the support lines so people with other problems were delayed.
Word got around too as I know one well-known newsagent supplier who was thinking about XchangeIT told me of their concerns of doing this because of what happened.
When this is over, I think some questions should be asked but knowing the industry, I doubt they will and if they were asked, I doubt they would be answered.
The advantage our clients had is that at all times we kept them as well as XchangeIT and the magazine companies informed on what was happening. We released emergency updates, put on extra support staff and started our main support bay from 6:00 AM. The support staff worked till very late answering calls to get through them all.
