MSE News: NatWest customers in lurch after meltdown

agrinnall wrote: »

This is likely to be an internal IT issue so asking who their IT provider is is a pointless exercise.

Indeed. 'IT provider' indeed. laughable.

dazza12 wrote: »

I've got a couple of friends who work for Natwest IT. Feeling sorry for them right now. However, they've told me what happened. Some idiot applied an untested update to their clearing system that corrupted a load of data. It has taken until today to unravel this, and put in place a new system. .

Sorry, but this simply isn't credible. All root / application account access to servers (required to perform application updates) has to be requested - approved by management - then access delegated to the user account wishing to perform the change.

NO access would be granted without an approved change. Your friends who work for Natwest IT need to be a little better briefed. Sorry.

ffghugsf wrote: »

Thanks for your quick response.

Yes, this would probably be a good solution for most people, but what I failed to explain was that I am actually disabled and housebound, hence why I use online shopping.

I would go to a branch if I could, but I really can't see any way to do so.

Any other suggestions please?

Don't you have any friends to help?. I'm sure you have a helper with the baby if you are housebound, to take baby for a ride out?

i was going to say call your local small shop up, ours is a co-op, explain to them and see if they can do anything

They may deliver some stuff, or just tell tesco, im sure they know whats happening, and im sure they will deliver if you tell them whats happening your side

ahxcjb wrote: »

Sorry, but this simply isn't credible. All root / application account access to servers (required to perform application updates) has to be requested - approved by management - then access delegated to the user account wishing to perform the change.

NO access would be granted without an approved change. Your friends who work for Natwest IT need to be a little better briefed. Sorry.

Not really sure why your apologising. Possibly an attempt to patronise? I bet you think I'm just some jumped up support monkey trying to impress. Sorry, you've got me wrong.

Your retort seems to imply that I was saying that somebody made an unplanned change off of their own back. Sorry, I don't recall me saying that at all. Natwest extensively test any change that needs to be made, on test environments with copies of live data. Various scenarios are tested and only when it's been signed off will any change be made to a live system.

I'm fully conversant with change control processes thank you. Many types of different processes, in many different sectors. It's part of my current job, and was when I worked in a Gov agency, an aerospace company and prior to that several assignments in the financial sector. You won't believe me, but I'd be happy to send you my CV along with client testimonials and copies of the relevant certifications.

For 'friends', read 'fellow IT contractors'. I didn't originally feel it was relevant to make the distinction, but as you're trolling and I'm biting, hopefully it helps you distinguish me from the guy who has a mate who also has a mate who knows someone who's married to a cashier.

The company I currently work for write software for the health sector. Absolutely everything we do has to go through a change control process. In this, customer management has to approve every change, including running simulations on test systems with samples of real data. Only after an extensive test does this then get signed off by both customer managment and our management and the upgrade performed with a working backup system in place in case all does go wrong.

Despite all of this, in the real world things go wrong. In many cases a factor that wasn't considered, whether user generated or down to a data issue. Test environments don't always reflect the real world. Anybody can make a mistake, miss a step on an install script or misread a command line. Whenever a process involves human interaction, anything can go wrong. Despite the 'perfect' system you describe.

In this case, an update was ran on a live system. It had been tested, but should have been temporarily decommissioned (services stopped etc) prior to this. This wasn't picked up on immediately, and transactions continued to process through an effectively broken system. This then corrupted live data. It took until earlier today to fully roll back the changes and recover the data that had been damaged, and then 'play' the transactions from the point of failure.

I apologise to everyone else - this isn't a techy forum and I'm sorry for dragging it down. Tried to keep it in non-techy speak but there's always one who has to tell you publicly how wrong you are.

meer53 wrote: »

I agree with this.

Maybe this problem will help people to manage better in the future if this sort of thing happens again.

I posted similar comments on another thread about the Natwest issues and was told my comments about keeping a stock of things were disgusting and bloody condescending ! :rotfl:

I think it's probably the way people read things. As you can probably see I also put what I thought was some helpful background info about the situation but was shot down.

About 12 years ago I had a relationship that broke up and I had to move into a bedsit. At the same time an employer I was working for went into receivership just before pay day and I was left with only £80 to last a month. Suffice to say I couldn't survive and had to beg and borrow from friends and family until I could get back on my feet.

From that day I decided I'd never be in that situation again. Every time I've gone shopping, I've bought the odd extra tin of beans, extra pet food, and whenever buying frozen food I tend to get an extra bag of one or more of what I'm buying. Only an extra pound or two, but over the months and years I've managed to build up a fair amount of extra food.

I lost my last job back in October, and the above was a lifesaver. I was out of work for 2 months and it meant for a couple of weeks I only needed to buy what couldn't be stored, such as milk or fresh veg. I could feed my family, and this was a huge weight off my mind.

I hope this doesn't come across as being patronising in any way, as this doesn't help those who have no food. Just something I learnt. I now assume anything will go wrong and just try my best to plan for it.