RDB Consulting Assists the CCMA With Database Management and Maintenance

Early in 2011, the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation & Arbitration (CCMA) issued a closed tender to find a suitable partner that could provide a database management service. While the organisation had previously engaged with a number of companies for their database management and support requirements, they continuously experienced problems with their response time and the outsourcing providers often didn’t have the appropriate skills for the CCMA’s environment.

RDB Consulting was chosen based on their track record, expertise, skills and price competitiveness – a choice that the CCMA hasn’t regretted. This has been an exceptionally rewarding project and I would like to share some details about the challenges that the CMMA faced and the solutions we were able to provide:

About the project

The CCMA is an independent body that provides a critical service to members of the public who have experienced some form of labour dispute. The organisation is reliant on its Information Communication Technology (ICT) department for support of its systems and database which houses information that is crucial to service it delivers – dispute resolution

The challenge: ensuring uptime, database upgrades and DBA

The CCMA receives and deals with labour issues and cases on a daily basis and makes use of its primary Case Management system which is dedicated to process the increasing number of disputes that the CCMA receives daily. The organisation receives up to 600 cases per day, making ‘uptime’ crucial.  A few hours of downtime can seriously impact productivity and hinder the progress of the volumes of cases they receive. The organisation needed to upgrade its Oracle data base from version 9.2.0.6 to a 10.2.0.4 and in addition, as they did not employ a permanent Database Administrator (DBA).

The process

The CCMA required a database maintenance service that would allow their Systems Engineer’s tasks to be more streamlined and have a positive impact on their service levels. The Case Management System and Oracle database supports branches on a national basis and therefore the maintenance and support thereof was a priority.

The CCMA needed a partner that could assist them in managing the increased volumes of cases.  In addition, they had plans to further increase their user based from 400 to include an additional 1000 users with a national roll out of our Case Management Systems to sister organisations. This would take the CCMA’s services to the ‘poorest of the poor’ and make a difference to the lives of ordinary people.

The benefits

Nersan Govender, General Manager of Operations at the CCMA, has told us that RDB Consulting’s solutions are allowing the CCMA to deliver a better service to South African employees as well as their employees; ensuring social justice is achieved for all citizens in South Africa. To date, RDB Consulting has been the longest serving database management company that the CCMA has engaged with.

Contact RDB Consulting for database management and maintenance – Jennifer Mbesa jennifer@rdbconsulting.com or +27 (0)11 807 7663