We were brought in to support on Production of Independent Cost Estimates (PR-ICE) and multiple areas of support.
We were brought in to support on Production of Independent Cost Estimates (PR-ICE) and multiple areas of support, including T45 Dockyard Support, Surface Fleet Power and Propulsion Systems, Command and Control Systems, Fire Emergency and Rescue Systems and Sonar 2087.
Situation
Maritime Support is continually challenged to reduce budgets while maintaining availability of kit and platforms. This is a challenging area to estimate as the key measure of availability across all platforms affected is not regularly or reliably collected at the level needed. Reports from contractors are biased towards the contractor not being responsible for any of the availability issues by use of NFF, Prioritised Maintenance, GFX Issue, and so on.
Task
Our team was involved in programme scope and risk review, cost estimate review and schedule analysis to ensure that the programme had a basis of estimate with clear assumptions and could justify the size of resources specified for each upkeep and upgrade task.
Action
We led the production of independent cost estimates, based on an integrated cost and risk schedule for multiple areas of support, covering the Dockyard services contract for the Surface Fleet, provided by Babcock (primarily for the T45) with various systems such as Power and Propulsion and Command and Control being managed fleet-wide.
Results
Independent cost estimates were produced for each area under investigation for review during the DE&S Planning Round assurance process. The final findings questioned the DE&S process for producing their PR budgets as several risk registers exist and risks are chosen to meet the budget restrictions.