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Slashing IT maintenance
budgets: sign of the times

No matter what the pundits say about an economic turnaround, times are still tough. And after technology projects are delayed or stopped, layoffs are made and next year’s budget is slashed, there’s one more realm where IT is feeling the pinch: maintenance cuts.

To help save money, IT groups are being asked to cut back — in some cases, dramatically — on their maintenance contracts with vendors. So instead of paying a premium for vendors to, say, fix any problems in key software and hardware within four hours, a 24-hour turnaround might have to suffice instead. Sometimes things stay broken until IT staffers can figure out the fixes themselves. And in the meantime, ITers involved say they just hope that their business users will not notice any ill effects.

Jim Milde, executive vice president of global services for Boston-based IT services company Keane Inc., estimated that of his largest customers — in pharmaceuticals, insurance, finance, government and transportation — around 10% are cutting maintenance costs in various ways.

This trend is being seen in pockets all over the industry, IT staffers and industry analysts agree. But given the sensitivity of the issue, and often the politics involved, most ITers would speak about it only on the condition that they are not identified.

Internet: <www.computerworld.com> (adapted).

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The word “trend”, in “This trend is being seen in pockets all over the industry”, can be correctly translated into Portuguese as tendência.