Completion Report

Project Summary:

The objectives identified in the Project Brief at the start of this project were: -

• To provide an automated interface suitable for downloading WPM payment data (journals) into eFin General Ledger in a secure and auditable manner.
• To provide a linked process that will allow the automatic posting of other manual journals in a similar, secure and auditable manner.

Both of these objectives have been met. Please note that the ability to automatically post manual journals was reduced in scope at the request of the project sponsor during the design stage.  Thenew design is that system provides the ability to automatically post journals from other applications but users producing manual journals will continue to use the ExelLoader routine provided by ABS.

Analysis of Resource Usage:

Staff Usage Estimate: 121 days

Staff Usage Actual: 170 days

Staff Usage Variance: 40%

Other Resource Estimate: 0 days

Other Resource Actual: 0 days

Other Resource Variance: 0%

Explanation for variance:

• in the original estimate it was assumed that there was only one format of manual journal file, but it was later discovered that there were in fact 4 discreet templates in use.  Each required different development work in order to be handled correctly.
• a two-stage design was originally requested pending approval from Internal Audit to automatically post into eFinancials.  This increased the effort required for the design stage.
• a late change was required to handle VAT variations on Accommodation Services delegate registration files which resulted in some re-work and re-testing
• a late requirement was highlighted for converting invalid xml files into csv for manual posting
• difficulties obtaining valid WPM  test filesfor development and testing as most of the live files did not confirm to the agreed format
• the low priority of the project (priority 3) meant that securing resources was often an issue.  This increased the project management effort required and delayed progress.

Key Learning Points:

• The project should have engaged with end-users directly  to fully understand their requirements rather than relying on information via FIS  (e.g. talking directly to Accommodation Services).  This would have flagged up the issue with VAT coding much earlier and prevented re-work late in the project.
• Reliance on one key FIS person for all of the WPM knowledge was a risk to the project and should have been managed more closely. When this key person left the University it left a large knowledge gap in the project which took some time to fill.  Future projects should ensure that key knowledge is documented and shared amongst the team.
• The business requirements and estimates for this project were inherited from ACS028 which resulted in an absense of contextual knowledge in the project team.  Future projects should ensure that any inherited documentation is fully verified with the team and the business.
• The relationship with WPM would benefit from having a key contact for each project so that the team know who to contact for support and testing issues.

Outstanding issues:

• The Finance Wiki pages for JAMS need to be expanded as they currently hold very little information - action for FIS to update their Wiki using the information held in the SDD (copy provided to FIS).
• There is an intermittent I/O error on the test environment which causes the overnight JAMS process to fail.  JAMS automatically recovers the data the following night and there is no data loss. Despite extensive investigation the cause of these I/O errors cannot be found due to their intermittent nature.  On the basis that JAMS automatically recovers from this error and it's only occuring on the test environment, it is not of great concern and should not prevent the project from closing - no further action required.