Slashdot Mirror
White House Reportedly Dismissing Key Healthcare.gov Contractor
Nerval's Lobster writes "Months after a problem-riddled rollout of the Healthcare.gov Website, the White House is dismissing a key contractor, CGI Federal, that built much of the portal, according to The Washington Post. The newspaper suggested the federal government is on the verge of signing a new contract with a replacement, Accenture, which has some experience in building online health-insurance portals on the state level. 'We are in discussions with potential clients all the time but it is not appropriate to discuss with the media contracts we may or may not be discussing,' an Accenture spokesperson is quoted as saying. Unnamed sources 'familiar with the matter' informed the Post of CGI Federal's dismissal, and suggested that it has much to do with continuing anger over the botched introduction of Healthcare.gov, as well as the pace of continuing repairs to the Website. As their contract is due to expire anyway at the end of February, government officials reportedly decided that it was the perfect time to pull the plug with a minimum of legal ramifications."
Holy fucking shit we're fucked.
Accenture does a fairly good job with contract development and support. This doesn't seem to be a bad call.
You can add another 9 months or more to allow whatever new contractor to take over the code base or start anew. And by the time, if ever, it is fully functional we can be sure the direction will have changed again.
What I'd like to know is which taxpayers agreed on spending their taxes on this? The only citizens I found supporting this are those who do not pay income taxes.
so they are looking for work anderson something they were called before the last larceny trial
And the next question is will these guys do any better?
I've been involved in contracting with governments, and failures of projects are as often as not caused by the incompetence of the government people and their inability to understand what they want, but then blamed on the contractors who couldn't make the system do what it needed.
As is always the case, some times the devil is in the details, and just because the project failed, doesn't mean the people blamed for it actually were the ones who made the project fail.
Sometimes, it just means it's easier to blame the contractor, when in fact the client was completely inept.
CGI has already received their $678 million dollars. Let's throw some more money at it to see if someone else can fix it now.
... but I don't think firing everyone in charge of a massive project does a lot of good when it you're trying to make it work.
First 6 posts are knee jerk reactions.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
It's not just the federal government (healthcare.gov) that's fucked this up; state exchanges (like Covered California, supposedly on the forefront of things, to say nothing of Oregon's health exchange, who, to put it kindly, isn't at the top of the heap) have also fucked this up.
But it's not just the governments that have fucked this up. The private insurers have fucked this up beyond all recognition. Anthem's web-based payment system was unable to accept payments during the last week of December. Customers who signed up weeks before the deadline weren't billed until the new year. Multi-hour wait times for humans have resulted in Anthem's CA PR-bot being inundated with complaints.
You don't have insurance until you actually pay. This is difficult when the insurance company itself refuses to accept payment.
Who cares if they get dismissed a few weeks before their contract expired. Do they still get paid for the steaming pile of shit they created? Absolutely. Will they continue to get government contracts after this blows over? Absolutely.
This is a PR move.
I would really like to know. I get big, I get complex, interconnections between this API and that, but frankly people do that stuff every day. Building an aircraft carrier is pretty complex too and they might go over on costs etc, but the end result seems to work pretty well. How is that doable when software projects like this seem almost doomed to fail?
This may just be the biggest software development failure of all time. Certainly the most public large scale software development failure.
... but I don't think firing everyone in charge of a massive project does a lot of good when it you're trying to make it work.
Supposedly only the front end is implemented, the web site that citizens use. The backend, the part that coordinates the various federal agencies and insurance companies involved, does the billing, etc has not been implemented yet.
If so it may not matter so much who implements the backend, the original contractor or the new.
In a company of 280,000+ employees, Accenture has the capacity and expertise to make the IT side of the government healthcare offerings work. My two biggest fears are both money related. One that the amount of money allocated to fix and maintain will be less than what is needed to do a sufficient job or that the money allocated will put into place less human assets of the correct expertise. Second that the correct expertise and money are both available, but that Accenture might direct more funds to profit while short changing the project with substandard expertise. If neither of these issues occur, then I expect this change could have positive impact. Throwing either new monies, or new management into the existing mix alone could have a negative impact. The right smart people, at all levels, need to be there, and care.
There is or can be built a machine that can simulate any physical object. -Church-Turing principle
They didn't get any of the taxpayers money before leaving. What a joke.
So how much more are we paying this new company to fix the three years of data junk the other one did? Then tell me who runs that new company and how is it affiliated with Obama? Because you know there is a connection somewhere.Also, why did they not do this a couple years ago?
Say what you will about Governor Christie, at least he did something about the scandal. Fire people is the only way to fix a problem and make others pay attention.
Obama can't fire people either because they will hang him out to dry in a book or they are friends and you never fire friends.
Its sickening how government's are being run these days. Worse then the mob corruption days of the 50's. Nobody cares about the average Joe in America. We have ridiculously high unemployment but because this has gone on so long. The popular number is actually going down from so many dropping off the grid.
7000 last month dropped out of the medical field. Do you think maybe they gave up because of Obama care? Could be.
You don't have insurance until you actually pay. This is difficult when the insurance company itself refuses to accept payment.
In some cases it may still be the government's fault. If the government has not communicated to the insurance company what that person's subsidy is the insurance company would not know what to charge the person.
& they are sponsored by the 'story' sponsors. sad news when everything is about liars touts & shills defending/promoting murderous & larcenious deceptions
Healthcare via personal drone to your front door. At least they know how to create an online market.
WTF they writing stuff in CGI at this point anyways? /sarc
A company so bad they had to change their name from Anderson Consulting to escape the stench.
More appropriately named Assenter. Next up to the gravy train will be Toillette and Douche.
$20 says that there will be source code not passed along, requiring reverse engineering or rewrites.
If I'm wrong, you'll have to see my ex because she has all my money.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
He can't do ANYTHING well, and the mess this health
care situation has become is one more proof.
From the congressional testimony, http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/24/politics/congress-obamacare-website/:
... an end-to-end test conducted within two weeks of the launch caused the system to crash. She said it was up to CMS to decide on proceeding with the rollout."
"In the first detailed account of what happened, officials of four contractors involved in the website creation described a convoluted system of multiple companies operating separately under the oversight of CMS, a part of the Department of Health and Human Services. Each said their individual components generally performed as planned after internal testing, but all conceded that CMS failed to conduct sufficient "end-to-end" testing of the entire system before the launch
"... blamed a decision by CMS within two weeks of the launch to require users to fully register in order to browse for health insurance products, instead of being able to get information anonymously, as originally planned."
The preceding should not be interpreted to mean that the contractor did good work. That may have been a problem as well. My point is that government officials were basically sabotaging their project through mismanagement. It appears that politicians were in control.
What is Accenture going to do? Hire the same people using the same process. They'll win the contract, and need people with healthcare experience. And who will be available immediately? The people the last consultants just terminated. Probably with active security clearances and everything. The net change will be zero.
When you're tired of screwing it up like amateurs, bring in Accenture so you can screw it up like professionals!
My firm has made a lot of money cleaning up Accenture's disasters. It's a living.
So while Accenture was originally based in Bermuda, they've since moved their corporate HQ to Ireland. Could we at least pick a vendor incorporated in the U.S.?
Software Shouldn't Suck
E-mail: frank at jacquette dot spamless com (remove the spamless!)
the infrastructure is in place for a single payer system... and has been since 1966.
If the product is terrible enough it is better to start from scratch than to try to fix it. From the stories I read the codebase for this is pretty terrible. http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/million-lines-of-code/ According the chart there is more code "written" for HealthCare.gov than the entire mouse genome. So starting over makes sense.
they just have to go through the same list of contractors Canadian Ministry of Health hired and fired in exactly same order
I assume you meant that as a joke. Unfortunately they chose an even worse technology - Java.
...into the fire.
Seriously, Accenture? Is there anything they've ever done right?
My experience is that CGI usually does a better job. This should be a mess!
The only hope (that someone already identified) is where they pick up all the CGI people working on the project already.
CGI stands for "Common Gateway Interface." It's not a programming language. Many web services are or at least can be run using this interface, such as PHP. While its true native webserver modules offer better performance, if you have a reason to write a webpage using C the like you'll most likely need to use CGI to do it.
In the future, when you go for the "funneh", try to know what you are talking about.
* Tons of real world experience
* Worked on lot's of high profile Government contracts
* Currently taking time off to spend with family
"the infrastructure is in place for a single payer system... and has been since 1966."
Medicare/medicaid is already wildly unsustainable despite taking care of minor minority of Americans. It is not the infrastructure you would want for a single payer system.
nothing new here. This is the default position for large contractors.
I have been contracting for a long time, and I get insane offers from big Gov contract holders.
Needed- Systems Admin. Must have (insert 20 major certifications in systems, networking, security, programming, and for some odd reason, bicycle design)
minimum experience 10+ years. $10/hr.
This seems like a huge opportunity for a company to actually deliver a product on time and within budget, or is this impossible!!!
Taxes are about 40% of the total of the government's income.
Where is Obama going to find another contractor corrupt enough to satisfy his standards?
Hmm. Well, maybe all the execs from this corrupt crew can get promoted to cabinet positions and Obama's existing cabinet can leave to form a new software company?
And send them your feelings on the matter.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/submit-questions-and-comments
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
Plus, they probably had 'donations' from both firms so they both need to eat at the govt trough.
The size of the codebase is so large that each component is a buggy untested mess. There is no way for anyone involved to say they tested that much code in that timerame. They all a bunch of liers.
Holy fucking shit we're fucked
Moving from the original contractor (Michelle Obama's university buddy - cronyism) to Accenture is like moving the project from a bumbling idiot to the mafia
But that's not the point either.
The point is - WHY IS THERE NOBODY INVESTIGATING MICHELLE OBAMA'S INVOLVEMENT IN THE FIRST PLACE ?
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Naw man, CGI's all the rage in movies these days.
"The Federal Reserve gives the Treasury 0 interest loans"
That's incorrect. In quantitative easing, a banker (mostly Goldman Sachs) buys T-bills at the current market rate, and then the Fed creates new money by fiat and buys it from the banker at a rate slightly above what the government charged the banker.
And you have to have interfaces with dozens of other systems, developed by dozens of other companies, poorly documented, with all sorts of idiosyncratic behavior or used in ways that doesn't appear in any documentation, but that's what the users do because it sorta, kinda works.
Oh, and some of those interface partners are actively hostile to working with you.
Repeat after me:
All Big Companies Suck
One of my life lessons learned The Hard Way. I'm not sure if there is an easy fix because smaller companies often don't know how to work with big gov't organizations. It's a choice of idiots versus the clueless.
Table-ized A.I.
Nobody's ever shown they are actually "buddies". Prominent Republicans have also gone to the same school at the time, and probably bumped into them at times. Does that make them "cronies" also? Let's not sling mud without solid evidence.
Table-ized A.I.
.. but I've read a few news stories about several attempts to begin starting up the 'back end' that have all failed catastrophically. Like loosing the records of entire states catastrophically.
If nothing else we're all going to find out when they start trying to turn it all on.
1. Enthusiasm
2. Planning
3.Disillusionment
4.Fear/Panic
5.Search for the Guilty
6.Punishment of the Innocent
7.Praise and Honors for the Non-Participants
So, after CGI has seen the Healthcare.gov through phases 1 through 6, we bring in Accenture and give them the credit.
Have gnu, will travel.
LOL out of the fire, and into the frying pan.
CGI stands for "Common Gateway Interface."
Actually, no. The incumbent contractor is a Canadian company named CGI Federal; CGI stands for "Conseillers en Gestion et Informatique" in French, which roughly translates to "Information Systems and Management Consultants"
Those who picked them should be fired too (oh thats right its was a no-bid choice of one of the Mooches college friends...)
From top to bottom negligence and likely outright fraud and worse.
Not to worry, it was only the taxpayers money wasted (and lots more yet to go down the same hole)
One hopes the Fraud-in-Chief and everyone else involved gets what they deserve in the end.
"You will be able to keep the jail cell you already have...." we can assure them of that.
Accenture, IBM, Booz Allen , Lockheed Martin , SAIC are all very similar when it comes to large project execution. The name of the game is to win a proposal by any means necessary then control the costs. In a large project it is never about the developers, what makes or breaks a large gov project is the quality of the functional analysts and tech management. If conflicting reqs and features can be argued down the proj will succeed.
Was that comment specific to this thread or just an observation about Slashdot in general?
Science is all about firing a drunk pig out of a cannon just to see what happens.
And as always, the US is stuck with a third world healthcare "System."
...si hoc legere nimium eruditionis habes...
Hey, is this the same Accenture that used to be Arthur Anderson, the ones who helped create the Enron mess and then renamed themselves afterwards?
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
There is no mystery or conspiracy. Romney effectively shot himself in the foot and less people voted for him than the other guy.
To find a mystery or conspiracy you have to go back as far as the Diebold machines, but even there it isn't certain. As for Florida in 2000 - that was just political brute force using the court as a weapon. No mystery or conspiracy there either.
I get the impression that if something done by a Californian government of any political type is not a complete fuckup then it's probably just too early to tell.
Engineers stand firm when a client tries to change the requirements of a bridge under construction. MBAs in charge of software projects go with whatever whim any of dozens of stakeholders come up with at any stage. Then the project is managed as a bunch of basketweavers each doing their own thing instead of a team effort. Throw in deliberate communications barriers to segment the project and provide fiefdoms for large egos and you get the source of more problems.
So it's "so hard" because it's seen to be "so easy".
The mindset is often: "It's only software - you can just rewrite it all on the fly can't you?"
Then: "It's only a software project, anyone can manage it can't they? You nephew plays that game on a computer a lot doesn't he and he did some business stuff somewhere? When can he start?"
Oh great now they are bringing AccidentSure into the project?
Fact #1: Accenture built the new IRS.Gov over two years ago.
Fact #2: It's still running.
I have a lot of mixed opinions about what it's like to work with them, but they're competent enough to know what is at stake if they screw it up.
So the new Federal Procurement process is that Tovarich Obama anoints a new contractor by Imperial decree with the price a secret?
Remember the press howling about Dick Cheney and Halliburton? That was a medicine dropper in the ocean compared to this. Where are all the libs howling about no bid contracts? My liberal friends bring up Halliburton to this day.
So Accenture will create a thousand page artifact describing everything that is wrong with the system. This document will be a political bombshell for the Democrats, so it will be hidden. To keep it a secret, all of the work will be off shored, insuring that no American ever works on this ever again. Trouble is, the White House has more leaks in it than a cheese grater, so you know the analysis will be leaked. This should provide entertainment for years to come.
Murphy was an optimist
That'll show 'em! Oh wait. The first contractor already cashed the check. Yeah, I agree with the first poster here. We're all fucked.
So again another failure, another scandal, and no accountability
Well it probably will not get any better, but will be more expensive. Arthur Anderson, the ancestor of Accenture once did a design for a state agency that included keypunching in the data in one location and trucking the cards 20 miles to the data center and this was when cards were almost gone. Some things never change.
What about that team of like 3 guys who created a working alternative to the healthcare.gov portal? http://science.slashdot.org/story/13/11/12/1339215/how-3-young-coders-built-a-better-portal-to-healthcaregov
Yes, I will grant that their site is based on the information from healthcare.gov but surely since that information already seems to be available and working for the most part, the government could ditch that portal and hire them to flesh out what they've already done (connect to the IRS/DHS/etc databases) and create something that actually works? Or would that just be too easy/logical?
Founder & COO, Hayai India (hayai.in) / USA (hayaibroadband.com)
#2 and part of #7. Take office politics which can be disastrous enough, add in normal politics, then sprinkle partisan politics.
Mix in a healthy dose of blood sucking contractors in #5.
I think those would be the major reasons. Other things like the procurement and bidding process that must be followed can also cause issues.
All the political BS basically causes change orders ad infinitum, by groups trying to get credit, by groups trying to get funding, by groups trying to get power, by groups trying to make it intentionally fail, by groups trying to turn it to another purpose or agenda, etc...
The contractor doesn't give a shit, as they will have a contract that has something unrealistic, then a few lines that say, in the event of change orders, which they know will have a boat load, they will have zero accountability, just point a finger to all the changes, when then go back the the departments, who will all point fingers at each other, all the time the contractor will smile and draw out as long as possible as all the money will be beyond the original contract due to change orders.
Anyway if you could get some of the political interference out of the bureaucracy it would likely do a lot to avoid this mess in the future (though you will always have personal politics and office politics).