Whitbread implements Oracle Financials application - Rising to the testing challenge

 

Whitbread is the UK's largest operator of full service restaurants, four-star hotels, budget hotels, health and fitness clubs and coffee stores, with many household name companies such as Marriott Hotels, Premier Travel Inn, Brewers Fayre and Beefeater, David Lloyd Leisure, TGI Fridays and Costa as part of the group.

As part of the growth strategy of this ambitious and growing company, efficiency and successful implementation of business critical IT strategies are vital.

When the decision was made to implement a leading solution from Oracle to improve the implementation of finance, human resources, payroll, supply chain management, procurement and MIS reporting across the group, there was a requirement to ensure that users in the business would be supplied with the required functionality in a timely manner.

It was realised at an early stage that customisation of interfaces would be required and that these would need to be thoroughly tested. A large amount of business critical data would also need to flow from existing systems into the Oracle application and then back again. This data transfer would also need to be tested to ensure the final data was correct.

As the final users of the system would be business users, it was decided to implement a User Acceptance Testing Strategy (UAT).

"We decided that we needed help to ensure that we could manage and control the UAT programme effectively. We also needed to be sure that we could communicate with the developers who were customising the code efficiently to keep time-to-deployment to a minimum." stated the Restaurant Business Systems Programme Manager.

SQS-UK were asked to prepare a UAT plan and strategy that would help business people to confirm the required functionality and the measurable results that could be tested. SQS-UK then helped and guided the documentation process, the test preparation process and the test plan.

A defect reporting system was implemented and daily reports to management were supplied. This enabled tracking plans to be effectively used.

David Lloyd Leisure was selected to run a pilot programme where a portion of the supply chain management system was implemented. This enabled valuable data and financial functionality experience to be collected before full implementation was undertaken.

SQS-UK managed and controlled the reporting of the UAT project for Restaurants Division. Liaison with business users was an important function. This enabled the test team to prioritise the testing and the management of defects and the reporting, delivering more efficient testing and implementation. SQS-UK also communicated with developers to speed the delivery of late code and defect fixes so that they could be applied quickly.

This management procedure brought structure to the programme, ensured effective measurement of the progress of the implementation and providing metrics to prove the improvements accrued.

"SQS-UK was a very reactive organisation. We felt that they listened to our requirements and we were provided with access to resources at all levels within their company, as we needed them. They showed a real drive to be flexible and meet our ever-changing needs and requirements." said Bob Wilde, Restaurant Business Service Programme Manager. "We are now discussing our requirement for enhancements and releases of improvements to the system and our ongoing Test Strategy."