End of Fiscal Year Brings Annual CIT Change Moratorium

With the end of the fiscal year, CIT has enacted its annual system change moratorium. CIT implements this restriction internally on system changes to help ensure a stable technology environment when NIH closes the old year's books and readies for the new fiscal year.

The moratorium is scheduled to run from close of business (COB) Friday, September 16th, to COB Friday, October 14th. It is possible that the moratorium could be lifted earlier, dependent on the status of NIH's financial systems.

What does the moratorium entail?

During the moratorium, any proposed system changes must receive advance approval from the recently-created CIT Change Advisory Board (CAB) (see related article Change Management at CIT in this issue). There are a limited number of blanket exemptions for systems such as Helix and Biowulf that have no bearing on financial transactions, and also for certain types of important but low-impact changes, such as virus scanning DAT file updates. However, outside of these few exemptions, all work during the moratorium is limited to what has been pre-approved by the CAB.

Of course, if an unplanned outage occurs, restoration of service is always our top priority.

To customers, the annual moratorium may mean delays or additional scrutiny in fulfilling some requests for CIT services. CIT appreciates your patience and support as we work to ensure a stable environment during this vital time of year.

Questions?

If you have any questions about the change moratorium, please contact the NIH IT Service Desk at 301-496-4357, 301-496-8294 (TTY), or 866-319-4357 (toll free), or online at http://itservicedesk.nih.gov/support/.

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