Steve Hall

Brexit - What could go Wrong? - Beware unintended consequences! further thoughts:- A modern economy is a collection of finely tuned systems, optimised over many years, by people whose experience and insight may no-longer be available due to job change, retirement, or death. We have had recent examples of companies trying to change (improve) their systems which resulted enterprise threatening situations. 1) KFC - Kentucky Fried Chicken. KFC decided to change their logistics company (save money??, better service??) Unfortunately the new company did not understand the fine detail of the companies needs and the internal logistics required to fulfil them. Chaos ensued for three weeks and resulted in KFC going back to the original logistics supplier. 2) Train Timetable Changes. Once again we see a finely tuned system thrown into chaos due to changes made by people who "manage" companies with no basic understanding of the intricate details, inter-relationships of the changes enacted. 3) A Bank - Computer System Change This cautionary tail of an in-house computer system change. I believe the original system was inherited from their original parent but data was being transferred to another system. It is clear the bank management were naive at best. This was a simple change that was, in hindsight undertaken without understanding the magnitude of the possible problems. It is clear in a system change whatever happens, you, the instigator of the change has to have understanding, the fire power and the manpower to deal with the resulting error rate. One error per day OK should be no problem! One hundred plus errors per second major problem. The Bank was woefully short of all three. 4) Malta Buses. Several years ago the country decided to reorganise the anarchic bus system then based on driver ownership. Ministers decided to reorganise the bus routes as well. I admit, that at the time, I thought that was a good idea. What they failed to realise that people had built their lives around the existing bus routes which were no-longer served by the new system. Since then, they had to replace Arriva who left with significant losses, car ownership has doubled and bus usage has further declined due to horrendous traffic jams. 4) BREXIT and leaving the Customs Union The port of Dover we are told currently handles 10,000 trucks per day with few delays.. The Channel crossing is a very finely tuned system. The time each ferry stays in port must be as short as possible. This is achieved currently by having as many trucks as possible (ideally a full load) ready to roll-on as soon as the arriving load, has rolled-off. This is only possible because of minimal paperwork and no custom checks. When each truck load has to be checked against paperwork, can the customs system provide that full boat load before the next ferry arrives? If it can't then ferries will start leaving without the full load and the capacity of the whole system will be much degraded. Imagine this going with a complete set of inexperienced personnel unfamiliar with the diversity of goods being transported, and the computer systems being used. Trusted carrier designation will mitigate some of this but beware carriers of mixed cargo! Another aspect of major change is that resources will be in the wrong place, as systems that worked in the old system, no-longer work in the new. When any synchronised system becomes unsynchronised the difference in throughput won't just be 5% or 8% lower, but could easily be 30-50% lower. That scenario will be acted out across the economy. The supply of all goods and services may suffer from major dislocations. Waiting for authorisation, non-compliance, wrong paperwork, products not arriving when promised, products can't be completed for a 2p part stuck waiting to cross the channel. The possibility for chaos is enormous. This seems to me to a recipe for disaster. Rather than the current 10,000 trucks per day I would be surprised if 5,000