BP pilots IT support opt-out scheme

BP is giving employees financial incentives to support their own computers.

The company is piloting a scheme on the west coast of the US with a small group of IT technicians, who will opt out of BP's support and maintain their own machines. They will receive an allowance for computer equipment in return.

A spokesman for BP said the scheme was designed to examine the benefits of consumer-style DIY IT support: "It's a little project for a few people who are IT experts. It's not over BP as a whole but for the IT wizards who can do those amazing things with computers.

"It's small scale - there is an allowance to buy more equipment for IT literate people but it's an allowance for equipment rather than a bonus, and one of the many things we are doing. The idea is to compare company-culture thinking with consumer-culture thinking. In other words, there's a lot of back office systems that consumers get by without - is there something we can learn here?"

Andy Jerram, CEO of Wireworx - a company that provides IT support to home and mobile business professionals - said that large firms are being forced to rethink their IT support strategy.

Jerram said: "There are FTSE 100 CIOs getting rapped over the knuckles by auditors for not best supporting their workers. BP is offering money [to staff] for not taking IT support. It could be the start of a new trend - the machines only cost £1,000 but the data on them costs a lot more time and money."