3.10 Early challenge and review of NS&I's strategy for the business and of SBS's strategy to deliver the contract would have been beneficial. NS&I would have recognised earlier that full migration of products to a single common IT platform may not have been necessary. With hindsight, NS&I and SBS consider that a review may not have delivered outputs any quicker. Nevertheless, what was delivered could have been planned better. For example, SBS, to achieve headcount reductions, invested heavily in imaging technology, when NS&I's strategy and its joint future with SBS will be better served through the development of new cheaper sales channels such as the Internet and telephony which would allow SBS to make less use of imaging technology.
3.11 Furthermore the approach to risk management was not sufficiently co-ordinated at all levels across the business and NS&I should have sought more reassurance, particularly on SBS's future income and expenditure projections.