Friday 31 August 2012

Dubious business practices.

Over the years I've developed the view that common courtesy is an essential part of client relationships. Part of the process is to show respect to clients/prospects. Wasting the time of a client/prospect shows a lack of respect.  When I see those signs of discourtesy I tend to assign the supplier to the blacklist/scam pile and refuse to do business with them in the future.

Take for example Clifton Asset Management Plc based in Bristol UK. They have the practice of periodically sending me prospecting letters offering Overdraft and Loan facilities for my business. As it happens we do not run our business using the debt model and we have no interest in such offers. What really annoys me is that the signed letters from Adam Tavener Chairman of Clifton Asset Management Plc are marked "Private and Confidential" on the outside of the envelope. The contents are clearly neither private nor confidential. Mr Tavener has no prior business relationship with me or my company. The wrongful labelling of the envelope is a deceitful practice designed to help the letter bypass any secretarial filter.

Such deceit does not bode well for any future business relations with this company so they are now blacklisted. 

However their letters continue to arrive. There is a note at the foot of the letters saying please contact Clifton "should you wish to unsubscribe"; yet another clear indicator of unsolicited mail as we didn't subscribe in the first place.  We've contacted them on previous occasions to ask them to stop sending such letters to our organisation to no avail.  

Earlier this week I phoned Clifton Asset Management to speak with Mr Adam Tavener as invited to do so by his letter. The call was answered by a telephone clerk. I made it clear I  wanted to discuss the dubious marketing practices with Mr Tavener, but I was told he's a busy man and would not be available.  I left a message for him to call me. I'm not surprised to have not been called by Mr Tavener. Ignoring my complaint is a further sign of disrespect.

Since then I've undertaken some research into Clifton Asset Management,  the associated companies, the management team and their history. They are certainly not the type of company that I'd consider using in any shape or form in the future.  It just goes to show that a lack of courtesy is a reliable business indicator. I have no evidence that their services are a scam, indeed they are registered and regulated by the Financial Services Authority, but it would be a cold day in Hell before I'd consider using them.

It seems like I'm not alone in these thoughts, and here.

Edit: 14/11/2013 We just can't seem to get away from these people. We've moved to a new location and are receiving mail for the previous occupant including letters marked "private and confidential". The return address on those letters is  TMS PO Box 10044, Hucknall NG15 5DQ which appears to trace back to Clifton Asset Management. We've marked them Return to Sender, but have no great hopes about the letters ceasing.

Edit: 31/01/2014 It seems like the Clifton Asset Management is still up to its old tricks. Despite requests from us to cease and desist sending us their junk mail we had another letter from them dated 27th January 2014. Marked "Private and Confidential" which it is not, the letter puts forward schemes to raid our pension funds by borrowing against them and along the way paying large fees to Clifton Asset Management. It seems a rather parasitic use of funds which should be held in trust for the fund members. This time however their website has changed to pensionledfunding.com. There appears to be a new name in the frame of Neil Greenaway as the Managing Director. I wonder what it will take for Clifton Asset Management to leave us in peace? 

Wednesday 8 August 2012

Planning for power (2)

In the previous blog entry on planning for power in a data centre I considered the need for a power budget and the need for a good change control process for variation in the power budget.
Most new data centres are initially only partially filled with equipment with space, facilities and resources left free for expansion. The power budget for the equipment expansion areas needs to be estimated in the early planning stages of the main construction project. It might be possible to postpone both capital and operational expenditure by fitting only the power infrastructure required at the moment, but in this case engineering space needs to designated and protected for future expansion. Additionally consideration needs to be given to the route through which electrical and mechanical plant will be moved during upgrades and maintenance.

When the power load has been established it will be possible complete the planning for air conditioning requirement.  The design of the air conditioning system will depend on what facilities exist for chilled water and what additional equipment can be installed within the building.

Consideration will needed on how long standby power will need to endure during a mains outage. This decision is not simply how long it takes for a standby generator takes to start and provide power. Consideration needs to be given as to how long it takes to gracefully shut down a data centre should the standby generators fail to start. An uncontrolled power crash can have devastating effects on ICT processing and the dependent businesses. The endurance requirements of the business will dictate how much energy needs to be stored in batteries. Consideration also needs to be given on how cooling will be provided if the generators fail to start. The required battery capacity affects the design of the battery room, but I'll cover that in a later blog article.

A joint decision will have to be taken, with the electrical engineer, on the power transfer switching arrangements will handover power to the standby arrangements and consequently back when Utility mains power is restored. For a data centre this switching is usually automatic with manual over-ride capability.

When the power requirement has been agreed, the engineers should establish the space requirements and weight of the air conditioning plant, machinery, transformers, switching gear, UPSs, generators, fuel tanks, batteries, ducting, piping and cabling  required. Agreement should be sought on where all of this equipment will be housed and mounted. The electrical equipment and air conditioning plant will impose an additional weight load on the building structure. The positioning of this weight/vibration load should be reviewed by a structural engineer to ensure the load is within the capacity of the building. Machinery such as generators, compressors and air handling units will create vibration in operation. This vibration might affect the building. The plans for damping and handling such vibrations should be reviewed by the building structural engineer.

Throughout the planning process it is highly likely that there will be obstacles to providing the equipment necessary to provide the power and cooling. For example there may not be enough space or the equipment is too heavy. In the worst case these obstructions may limit the amount of technology which could be deployed within a building. In any event there are likely to be many cycles of the planning process before an agreed solution can be achieved. Depending on the complexity of the data centre this process may take a few months. The process may involve agreement from the owners of the building and also regulatory planning authorities. If the original assumptions on power requirements change after the design has been settled it can be an expensive problem to fix.

Part of the planning process is to provide a solution which is affordable to the business client. It is in effect a process of risk assessment with the client where the proposed capital and operational costs are weighed against the risks and what the business can afford.