Audit Issue Action Plans Checklist

Guidance Note

1

Elexon informs you which of your Audit Issues require an EFR action plan to be submitted within 20 Working Days.

The notification will be sent by ELEXON once the Auditor has confirmed the ratings for each audit issue it has identified.

Elexon - The EFR team will usually send the email to you and copy your OSM in the correspondence.

2

Upon receiving the notification, you should send Elexon a plan to address the error or failure.

20 WD

Audited organisation

3

Elexon then reviews the plan and either; baselines the plan if we are satisfied with it or; provide comments on the plan explaining where changes or further considerations are needed.

If Elexon returns comments, the updated plan is required within 10 WD (in accordance with BSCP538.

20 WD

Elexon – Your OSM will be the main point of contact regarding this

4

You should update the plan to address Elexon comments.

10 WD

Audited organisation

5

Step 3 and 4 have to be completed again until a plan is baselined.

See steps 3 and 4

6

Once the plan is in place, Elexon will monitor your milestones. You need to provide us an update on the milestones in your plan.

Within 5 WD of the milestone

Audited organisation

Action Plan Requirement

In Plan? Y/N

1

The plan submitted has been revised for this audit period (not an old plan which has been resent)

2

For audit issues that have existed for more than one year (and were covered in previous audit(s)), please specify what failed in the previous plan and introduce another way of addressing it this year.

3

The plan should have regular (at least bi-monthly) timescales to provide Elexon with reassurance that the issue is being adequately addressed and working (even if this is a milestone confirming no re-occurrence of the problem for that reporting period)

4

In cases where the auditor has found an issue from a sample, you should check the rest of the portfolio (either by checking each instance or by further sample checks) to determine the extent of the issue across the portfolio and any issues found are corrected.

5

After reading the issue found by the auditor, the plan clearly describes a means of addressing the defect and a Forecast Issue Closure date of when your organisation anticipates the full resolution of this issue

6

The plan provides the details of a senior manager or director within the organisation that is responsible for supporting the plan. This person should have reviewed the plan.

Action Plan Requirement

In Plan? Y/N

1

Does the plan make it clear how the proposed software change will address the audit issue once implemented?

Regular Milestones should be in place to demonstrate that this interim manual approach is working.

2

Does the plan also address what will be done to improve processes manually until the software is deployed?

3

Does the plan make it clear when the software will be deployed and have a clear milestone for deployment?

4

Does the plan make it clear that this deployment is a priority for the organisation’s IT team?

Regular milestones to confirm the plan for implementation is still on target should be in place.

5

Following deployment, does the plan have regular milestones to receive reports demonstrating that the software fix is in and is working?

Action Plan Requirement

In Plan? Y/N

1

Does the action plan contain a clear statement of how your processes will change to ensure missed process steps or timescales will be captured going forward?

2

Does the action plan detail how any previous errors (identified by the auditor) will be addressed if necessary?

3

Does the action plan detail how your staff will be informed/trained on the changes to the process?

4

Does the action plan detail how the management will monitor to ensure the new process will be adhered to and provide Elexon regularly with a copy of the management reports to show Elexon that it is working in line with the BSC and any exceptions have been recorded and robustly dealt with?

1

Does the plan provide a clear analysis of the root causes that are leading to a backlog being built up within systems?

This should be accompanied by milestones with mitigating actions against each root cause identified (with evidence that the root cause is being addressed).

2

Does the plan provide clear backlog numbers which match to the audit issue?

It is often helpful if these are categorised so that the “working” of the backlogs can be discussed in more detail if necessary.

3

Does the plan provide a monthly plan of backlog reduction to reduce the numbers of the backlog within either compliant spectrum or to a match number in the backlog that would be considered a “lower” or “closed” issue by the auditor.

4

Does the plan detail the resource assigned to tackling the backlog and detail how much of the backlog would be expected to be tackled by one full time member of staff per day or per week? Does this resource projection match with the monthly plan of backlog reduction and is it ambitious enough?

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