Great Yarmouth Borough Council abolishes IT black-outs

Great Yarmouth implements Bull mainframe for offsite disaster recovery

20 January 2003 - Great Yarmouth Borough Council has ensured it can provide continuous services to citizens, even if disaster strikes.

The local authority has implemented a Bull offsite disaster recovery solution two miles from its main headquarters. Even if it loses data and is unable to access records, be it through a fire, hack attack or natural disaster, it will still be able to operate. This means that critical services, such as benefits payments, council tax collection and payment processing, can continue come what may.

As well as using the company's hardware, Great Yarmouth will make use of Bull's support services. The infrastructure solutions provider will be the first port of call for any queries regarding disaster recovery. This means that the council will benefit from having full control over its hardware, without the high costs associated with outsourcing the service.

"We approached a number of disaster recovery experts during the procurement process, but none could provide the level of service that Bull offered," said Cliff Grosvenor, head of administration and technology at Great Yarmouth Borough Council. "The support arm means we will always have consultants to turn to for service and advice, but without the prohibitive costs involved in outsourcing the whole project. This, bolstered by our 14 year relationship with Bull, means we are sure we have made the right choice for this mission-critical project."

"With Blair's 2005 e-government initiative, the majority of local authorities are now completely computerised," said Phil Ruston, senior sales manager, public sector, at Bull UK and Ireland. "This means that if they were to lose their data, they'd find themselves in real difficulty - which would have a direct knock-on effect on citizens. With all documentation in electronic format, councils can no longer afford to put back-up and disaster recovery at the bottom of the agenda."