FASTtalk July 2009
Vendor audits are up, business finances are down.
But organisations fearing a catalogue of audit notifications
can still help themselves, as the FAST regional account management
team explains.
Recent research by Trustmarque Solutions has shown there has
been a 35% increase in activity from software vendors auditing
licences, with one in four checks being triggered by
finger-pointing employees. There’s little doubt that in the current
climate companies are at risk.
FAST has seen the stresses such
audits can cause even for companies that are household names. One
organisation found unwanted software and then a need to establish
its compliance position left its day-to-day operations paralysed as
firstly compliance audit letters had to be verified, then company
lawyers had to be informed and finally board level executives had
to be briefed on the potential financial risk to the company of a
hard-line audit and subsequent reconciliation mandate. Meanwhile
staff were chasing around trying to confirm the company’s licence
position.
One of the first problems that an organisation may find when it
receives a compliance request is to understand to whom it was sent
and on what terms it was issued. Initial contact may be in the form
of an audit questionnaire. Whatever the tone, both the company
lawyers and your FAST Account Manager should be informed.
Once one software publisher is in touch with a company about an
audit, there is a reasonable prospect that others will follow -
i.e. the Domino Effect. In today’s cash-strapped business
landscape, software vendors need to find ways of maintaining
revenues, so with fewer new sales likely, vendors may look to
maximise revenue from existing customers. Acknowledge the receipt,
speak to FAST and your legal team, and then look at the state of
your proof of compliance.
Having informed your company lawyers, and your FAST Account
Manager, initially write back to the software publisher saying you
are happy to see them regarding their request while advising/asking
the following:
- We are a customer of FAST and are working towards the
FAST Standard for Software Compliance
(FSSC-1:2007)
- What applications or versions (e.g. Standard or Pro) is the
publisher looking for?
- What access they will need?
- How will the audit be conducted?
- Will the publisher need to load an audit tool on to the
network?
- Will they conduct a manual walk round audit?
- Who will conduct the audit? the publisher themselves or their
agents?
- What resources/amount of your time will the audit take?
- See what the software publisher comes back with and
then contact your FAST Account
Manager to discuss/address any further issues.
- Expect a culture-shift after the audit and prepare for it
accordingly.
You should also consider the following:
- Look at your maintenance contracts for details and proof of
payment. If a publisher is accepting payment for maintenance and
support on a product it would be difficult to argue you don’t have
the right to use it.
- Has your company merged or was it taken over with a subsequent
name change? In such circumstances an organisation should check
their licence agreements to see that they allow novation. These
checks should be part of ‘due diligence’ and it may be that you can
trace details of licensing/proof of entitlement from here.
Remember, as you are trying to build a picture of your proof of
entitlement, the more items you have the better that picture will
be.
Logistically, most organisations will look towards a paid,
detailed invoice (publisher, application, and version) which
provides a number of easily cross-referenced items, e.g. invoice
number, payment number etc. In this situation, due to the
cross-referenced items, it would be difficult for a publisher to
dispute your right to use.
If you have full packaged products, you should
be able to produce:
- All physical media supplied when you bought the software, such
as the CD-ROM
- Accompanying paper documents the end-user license agreement
(EULA), if supplied as a hard copy
- The certificate of authenticity (COA) from the box
- Your invoice, which should list the software title and full
details of what was supplied, as well as the stock-keeping unit
number.
For pre-installed software (OEM licences), you
should be able to produce:
- The paper documents
- The end-user licence agreement EULA, if supplied on paper
- The certificate of authenticity (COA) on the PC chassis, OR the
manual covers, OR
- The original CDs OR their accompanying documents, OR as
separate COA documents
- Your invoice, which should list the software title and full
details of what was supplied, and the stock-keeping unit
number.
For volume licences, you should be able to
produce:
- The licence agreement
- The licence confirmation document your original invoice, with
details of what software you ordered.
This article was produced by FAST Account Managers - experts in
delivering IT compliance and software asset management advice and
training to customers of the FAST Compliance
Programme.