2.36 Shortly after the Department and BT signed the contract in July 1997, the Department selected Ovum consultants to confirm that the prices in the contract were reasonable when compared with others in industry, and to benchmark the agreed prices with industry comparators on a quarterly basis. Ovum concluded that the prices were generally favourable, bearing in mind the Department's special security requirements, which meant that each price would contain a premium to provide these requirements. This information has helped the Department to monitor the reasonableness of BT's prices although information of this nature would also have been useful before the contract was let given that service prices were only finalised during the Department's final negotiations with BT.