Banking web development and financial website design

Mist Systems Ltd
Manchester, UK
Jan’08 – Present
Freelance Web Development and Consultancy

As a director of Mist Systems, I work on a number of concurrent client projects. At the time of writing the two main projects are: Website for an Online Bookmaker bet hedging system with extensive use of outbound and inbound SMS text processing; and Temple Security (a supplier of security services to large blue-chip companies) for whom I am developing a customer query and KPI tracking web application.

eSeekers Ltd
Oxford, UK
Jul’06 – Dec’08
QA Manager

eSeekers was a brand new start-up focused solely on developing the ShareNow brand and product (see www.sharenow.com). ShareNow is a social networking (SN), user-generated content (UGC) and Instant Messaging (IM) system based on peer-to-peer (P2P) technologies, and is free to users. My role was to introduce quality processes throughout the development and test teams, and to manage the processes. At the time of writing the development team was 9 people and the test team was 4 people. The company used RAD and Agile development processes so it was a challenge to apply traditional test and QA processes in such an environment. We implemented the Mercury QA toolset, and also used a variety of documentation and process controls distilled from numerous previous projects.
Contact: Reference available upon request.

Pragma Gaming Ltd
Cheshire, UK
Aug’05 – May’06
Lead Architect

I joined this new venture as a permanent employee to design and manage the build of a massively scalable 3D online Poker system. The project did achieve some early working prototypes, but fell apart when the company stopped paying staff and suppliers (myself included) and ended up in Administration. Extremely unrealistic deadlines and a total lack of project management were the prime causes of this failure.
Contact: No references, I am in dispute with this company.

Mist Systems Ltd
Manchester, UK
Nov’04 – Aug’05
Freelance Web Development and Consultancy

Mist Systems started out as a vehicle for building and operating the www.impossiblebets.com website. Since that went live, Mist has acquired several new clients and delivers hosting, support (remote and onsite), development and consultancy to these clients. Mist has grown to have four consultants at this time. Clients are spread across numerous industries including internet gaming, internet betting, financial consultancy, venture capitalists, investment brokers and others. My role as a company director was mostly pre-sales for technical consultancy and projects, and I also acted as a senior technical and project consultant where required. I travelled a lot to perform these roles from my base in southern France. I remain a director of Mist Systems Ltd.

Global Capital Group
London, UK
Nov’03 - Nov’04
Consultant

Global Capital Group outsource many of their IT systems to external companies. Working at Group level, I provided a liaison and technical overview role. I was also involved in hands-on development of some web-based systems, internal and external. Reporting directly to the MD, I was responsible for driving forward their use of IT systems and ensuring that suppliers and sub-contractors were all working to spec and to time. This was very much a ‘jack-of-all-trades’ role as Global do not employ any IT staff of their own. The projects covered topics as diverse as: implementing a new international bank; implementing multi-language changes to an internet betting website company (www.capitalsports.com); implementing Verified By Visa and Mastercard SecureCode in various payment processing sub-systems; co-ordinating the transfer of all the company’s systems from one ISP Hosting Service to another; and managing small-to-medium software developments. This work was possibly the most challenging I have encountered in my career to date, and demanded significant commitment in time and effort.
Contact: Reference available upon request.

API Group PLC
Cheshire, UK
Mar’03 - Nov’03
Consultant

I was hired specifically to aid (with one of their permanent project staff) a major implementation of a company-wide ERP business system within API Group. Initially based on SysPro, and then switching to Oracle Financials during the specification stage, my role was focused on the Shop Floor, Warehousing and Production areas. I was responsible for analysing the requirements (including the need for RF tags to track stock, truck-mounted wireless workstations, scanners, etc.). I ran numerous workshops/meetings etc., to meet the workforce and collect requirements, and visited most of the UK-based plant facilities within the group. I formulated the requirements into a top-level design and this was my main deliverable to API Group. Also, during the last few weeks of my contract period, I implemented the API Group website (www.apigroup.com) and intranet systems.
Contact: Reference available upon request.

Betabet PLC
Milton Keynes, UK
Mar’00 - Jan’03
Development Manager

Involved from the start of the company and reporting directly to the MD, I was responsible for all elements of the design and development of in-house systems including: database, website, credit card processing, security, performance, branch systems, administrative systems and MIS, and integration with a large number of affiliate companies and web-sites. The team was six in-house people, plus another six at two supplier companies. Development was performed mostly on Microsoft platforms using VB, VBS, ASP, Java and JavaScript, C++ and SQL stored procedures. The design of the company web-site (www.betabet.com) was also my work. The role also demanded costing, estimating, planning, liaison with suppliers, staff reviews, management reporting, task scheduling/management and indeed all normal team management tasks.

J.P. Morgan
London, UK
Jun’99 - Mar’00
Test Team Leader

As part of the Concorde programme, I was responsible for running the Test Automation team within a larger, central Test Centre project team. The team of five staff was charged with implementing automated testing using WinRunner, LoadRunner and TestDirector. The applications under test were Unix (Solaris) and NT-based, built using both Murex and Java toolkits, but with the automated test execution taking place on Windows NT 4.0 workstations (via Exceed). In addition, I defined the overall test automation strategy, and contributed to the larger QA strategy adopted by the Test Centre.

I.S. Integration
Preston, UK
Jan’99 - Apr’99
QA/Testing Consultant

As an I.S. Integration associate, I provided consultancy services to a range of I.S. Integration's clients. I specialised in technical support for the Mercury Interactive WinRunner and LoadRunner product family - for which I.S. Integration is an accredited support organisation. This support work involved significant travel, including places like Warsaw, Poland, and Buenos Aires, Argentina for their client Citibank. In addition to client work, much of my time was spent in the production of a new IS Integration software product known as ‘BusinessTest’. I was involved in design and development of the Windows front-end components – created using VB 6.0 with ODBC under Windows 98 and Windows NT 4.0.
Contact: Reference available upon request.

Bank of Scotland
Glasgow, UK
Sep’98 - Nov’98
Test Analyst

I was a member of the User Acceptance Test team charged with testing a custom developed Unisys Urbis system for the bank. The team followed Cap Gemini’s standard test methodology. The activities included Y2K test planning, data preparation, test scripting, test execution, implementation of test automation tools (WinRunner and Excel VBA) and the use of Test Director for test management and defect reporting. During the contract I was also asked to write a mid-project general review report and made a number of recommendations – at a management level – for improvements to the overall project process. The systems used during the project were Windows NT 4.0 workstations and AIX on RS6000 Unix systems.

Barclays Bank PLC
Knutsford, UK Dec’97
Sep’98
Development and Test Manager

I was retained directly by Barclays Bank to participate in the design, development, testing and implementation of the new Integrated Sales Desktop project - a migration of the legacy system from Ingres/ABF on Digital Unix to Visual Basic on Windows NT. The desktop environment included the design and development of a ‘container’ application that provided both visual and infrastructure services to the user and to the hosted business functionality applets within it. The container incorporated ‘soft-phone’ telephony controls from Genesys, bespoke Wallboard software from CallCentric, converted Ingres/ABF-to-VB code from PeaceTower, and much in-house development in VB. My role was to co-ordinate the design of all these components on the desktop, advise the bank on strategic, re-usable, modular, object-oriented design, and manage and assist the in-house development team in producing the system. In addition, I spent specific time designing the end-to-end test strategy and quality assurance sub-systems, and I was responsible for the test team (18 staff). In parallel, we introduced design modelling using Rational Rose and UML and automated testing using WinRunner. The project involved overseas travel on behalf of Barclays and liaison with a number of the Bank’s suppliers. Most notable of these suppliers was Digital (DEC) with whom I liaised significantly, eventually discovering that they could not deliver and having to re-position the project with alternate technologies and schedules. The project rolled out to Barclays’ three call centres around the UK and to a total of over 2000 users. The Container application supports future business application rollout including workflow and imaging applications.
Contact: Reference available upon request.

Dresdner Kleinwort Benson
London, UK
Aug’97 - Nov’97
Business Liaison/Support Consultant

The Service 97 project was designed to build and manage an integrated computing platform, based on Windows NT v4.0, and to also handle the practicalities of deployment and support of a large user-base - initially 250 PCs increasing to several thousand in later phases. Initially with the development/engineering team staff I transferred to the front-line support team where I acted as an engineering team representative. I provided not only technical support but also set up a support team process for Quality Assurance and Test facilities. This process smoothed the path of accepting a new piece of software into the standard platform build.
Contact: Reference available upon request.

Deutsche Morgan Grenfell
London, UK
Jun’97 - Aug’97
Test Analyst

Working on the Global Markets MIS project, I was responsible for designing, developing and executing test plans. The system was based on Oracle RDBMS v7.3 and Windows NT 3.51 & 4.0, and used Excel v5 and v7 as both data entry screens and reporting screens. Extensive use was made of Excel-based VBA in the system. I was one of just two Test Analysts and supported my colleague by developing test tools where necessary. A number of these were built using Microsoft AccessBasic (v2 and v7). The most significant tool I developed was a synchronised transaction driver that simulated up to 30 remote sites entering data into the Oracle database. This tool was used extensively for performance, capacity, volume and stress testing and unearthed a number of system problems.
Contact: Reference available upon request.

Pontis Consulting
Manchester/London/Holland
Nov’93 - Jun’97
Consultant

I joined the Pontis Consulting partnership as one of the first employees only a year after its inception. As a full-time employee, I worked on a number of Pontis’ largest clients, including Lloyds TSB Bank plc and Barclays Bank plc. The TSB project was the larger period (nearly two years) during which I concentrated primarily on Test Strategy implementation and Quality and Audit procedures. This work also involved the design and development of tools to support the proposed development processes. The project aimed to migrate the architectural design of their ageing proprietary branch system (under CTOS), using distributed computing and object-oriented design techniques, to a position whereby the whole system could move onto Windows NT systems. This posed fundamental problems for testing and required a complete re-think over traditional testing methods. The remainder of my time at Pontis was spent largely working on several Barclays Bank projects. The most recent work was as a member of a project team delivering a Distributed Computing Strategy to Barclays’ Technical Strategy Group. This project was initially as a conceptual piece of work, but quickly progressed through proof-of-concept and prototype phases, to the point where the bank commissioned a full-scale implementation of the proposed architecture for their Corporate Client business systems. My responsibilities were four-fold within the project: The two largest areas were a significant amount of Visual Basic development coupled with an Intranet solution based across multiple hardware and software platforms. In addition, I contributed test strategy design and development, together with an integrated ADE strategy and implementation. Technologies utilised in this project included Windows NT, SQL Server, Internet Web Servers, HTML, VB Script, Active-X, Visual Basic, Visual Test, WinRunner, SoftLab Enabler, and Visual SourceSafe. Other work for Pontis Consulting included significant time spent at client sites, assisting project teams to implement quality testing mechanisms, and highlighting areas of risk requiring greater attention during test cycles. I was also lucky enough to travel abroad during my time with Pontis.
Contact: Reference available upon request.

NatWest Home Loans
London/Birmingham, UK
Nov’92 - Nov’93
Analyst Programmer

At NatWest, I worked within the Home Loans division for the I.T. Projects team. The majority of my time was spent on a imaging and workflow project implementing new business processes using Visual Basic on top of CentreFile’s workflow toolkit (OLE components), utilising SQL Server via ODBC as a back-end database. This project also implemented embedded Terminal Emulation via DDE to the InfoConnect package. This was also my earliest exposure to Windows NT in early 1993. My duties involved liaison between CentreFile in London and Home Loans in Birmingham regarding acceptance of releases of the WinWork workflow toolkit. I also participated in the development of the Visual Basic front-end.
Contact: Reference available upon request.

Lloyds TSB Bank Plc
Manchester, UK
Sep’90 - Oct’92
Analyst Programmer

In TSB, I worked in the Branch Systems department, supporting Unisys’ CTOS/BTOS Systems. This involved both live systems support and development team support. I worked for the team that configured and implemented the operating system for the Branch systems. In addition to technical support, the role included liaison between TSB and Unisys regarding fault tracking and resolution on Unisys CTOS-based products. Some development work was also undertaken for TSB using Pascal. In all, I completed four back-to-back six-month contracts for TSB before leaving as one of the last three contractors to survive a TSB management cutback on the use of contract staff.
Contact: Reference available upon request.

Unisys Ltd (Burroughs Ltd)
UK
Jun’88 - Sep’90
Analyst Programmer / Customer Support Analyst

Having worked the sandwich year of my degree course for Burroughs in 1986/7 (in their Commercial LOB division), I joined Burroughs full-time a year later. Shortly afterwards they completed a corporate merger with Sperry and became Unisys. On my reappointment, I joined the Financial LOB division directly, which effectively shaped my career from that point onwards. I started on Unisys’ TSB project as a graduate trainee and spent time on the CTOS/BTOS operating system and Oracle RDBMS. My particular focus was on Systems Management Systems. The team developed the basis of TSB’s current Branch System, and I was fortunate enough to travel to California to help present the system to the Unisys plant staff who would have to support it as multiple corporate products.
Contact: Reference available upon request.

You may also wish to see Stuart's portfolio of web development work.