Transnet's battle over IT service takeover continues

[Hanno Labuschagne]

Transnet's battle over IT service takeover continues

Transnet is appealing a High Court ruling which has prevented it from disengaging from a R1.5-billion contract with Gijima Holdings for IT services after the agreement's term ended, City Press reports.

Gijima's contract with Transnet came to an end on 30 November 2024, but it has refused to hand over control of the systems to Transnet's internal staff.

 

[My_King]

Reminds me of a kak IT company here in Kempton.

The owner of a small company using them is not a M364 admin. No one is.

Log a ticket so the owner can become an admin...you then get sent a 2 pager "we take no responsibility" type kak.

Imagine all the kak that the companies have to go through if that "IT company" goes under.

If you sell M365 products, you are a reseller.
If you administer M365 for customers, you are a co-admin.

Giving companies sole admin rights to your environments is a stupid idea.

MS calls it GDAP. You as the IT support company can ask for all or very specific GDAP access.

The company can then revoke access when they want.

Why should the owner sign a 2 page document for this???

 

[Jet-Fighter7700]

^^^ you sound like you have very specific knowledge of this,

luckily I never had to deal with it, but it seems like M365 admin rights are a very touchy subject for some orgs,
I imagine Google admin and AWS admin are the same.

this is the nasty side of it support, when it all goes sideways

 

[My_King]

^^^ you sound like you have very specific knowledge of this,

luckily I never had to deal with it, but it seems like M365 admin rights are a very touchy subject for some orgs,
I imagine Google admin and AWS admin are the same.

this is the nasty side of it support, when it all goes sideways

Think of it this way.

You start a company. Call it Kontoso. One of the first requirements are IT environments.

So lets say emails.

You or an account only you own must have the initial admin rights.

When you then sign a contract for IT support, that is when you assign GDAP rights and approve the IT company for access to your company's environment.

Now **** happens.

You remove GDAP access from said IT company and give GDAP rights to the next IT company.

This is the easy example.

 

[My_King]

@Jet-Fighter7700 vs...

I support 50 companies.

From email setups to Intune device administration or even MS Teams administration.

Tomorrow a car hits me, I die.

I was the sole tenant admin and only I with my MFA have admin access.

What now for the 50 companies?

 

[wingnut771]

Gijima’s contract with Transnet came to an end on 30 November 2024, but it has refused to hand over control of the systems to Transnet’s internal staff.

The company is concerned that the handover would disrupt Transnet’s operations and has asked for a transition plan, including provision for a suitable mainframe computer to which it can transfer the data.

How long has transnet been disrupted?

 

[Jet-Fighter7700]

@Jet-Fighter7700 vs...

I support 50 companies.

From email setups to Intune device administration or even MS Teams administration.

Tomorrow a car hits me, I die.

I was the sole tenant admin and only I with my MFA have admin access.

What now for the 50 companies?

fair point, I assume you have backups, or somebody has access, or even Microsoft can get admin access in such an event.

 

[My_King]

fair point, I assume you have backups, or somebody has access, or even Microsoft can get admin access in such an event.

Jip, for all customers, I ensure they know they have full control on a named account and that I am not the owner for their tenant.

My partner account then only have limited GDAP rights.

I also do not do kak like admin@whatever.

If someone takes any action, I want to know what named account did the action.

 

[SauRoNZA]

Jip, for all customers, I ensure they know they have full control on a named account and that I am not the owner for their tenant.

My partner account then only have limited GDAP rights.

I also do not do kak like admin@whatever.

If someone takes any action, I want to know what named account did the action.

Even in self-managed environments we made sure there are at least two administrators for all systems as well as a “break glass” type service account for exactly these situations.

 

[Bad Ballie]

Reminds me of a kak IT company here in Kempton.

The owner of a small company using them is not a M364 admin. No one is.

Log a ticket so the owner can become an admin...you then get sent a 2 pager "we take no responsibility" type kak.

Imagine all the kak that the companies have to go through if that "IT company" goes under.

If you sell M365 products, you are a reseller.
If you administer M365 for customers, you are a co-admin.

Giving companies sole admin rights to your environments is a stupid idea.

MS calls it GDAP. You as the IT support company can ask for all or very specific GDAP access.

The company can then revoke access when they want.

Why should the owner sign a 2 page document for this???

Type of company you never want to do business with, they hold all the card and have an effective choke hold on their clients, Better to lose everything and start again in the long run. We have a similar type IT Company locally Small start ups with low IT skill think they are great until there is a dispute.

 

[Ernabr]

@Jet-Fighter7700 vs...

I support 50 companies.

Tomorrow a car hits me, I die.

I was the sole tenant admin and only I with my MFA have admin access.

What now for the 50 companies?

I was appointed by a company to recover from exactly this situation. It was the toughest job I ever had!

 

[Zarathustra]

"Transnet previously instructed Gijima to switch off all services by 23:59 on 12 December 2025. Gijima complied, but the ensuing chaos led to Transnet having to retract its instruction."