Price the period when two systems must coexist
An import estimate can be accurate and still leave a project underprepared for cutover. Staff may need to operate the old and new systems together for a defined period, compare results and retain access while exceptions are resolved. Those are real tasks with owners, even when no additional screen is being built.
This fictional organization is moving its supplier-request register. One proposal covers mapping and importing all active requests. A second includes a rehearsal and a period of parallel operation, but neither initial summary explains who will reconcile the two registers or when the old one may stop being used.
Identify the work hidden behind “go live”
The owner examines the daily task. During the proposed overlap, coordinators would enter new requests in the source register and the candidate application. A reviewer would compare identifiers, assigned staff and current states. Any discrepancy would need a decision before staff could rely on the new register alone.
The organization's current staffing cannot support that work for the entire active population while maintaining ordinary operations. The issue is not an unspecified contingency allowance. It is a concrete second-entry and reconciliation workload that the proposal has not assigned.
The two options are rewritten in operational terms:
| Scope choice | Work during transition | Dependency that must be funded or supplied |
|---|---|---|
| Import all active work, then compare everything | Broad duplicate entry and reconciliation while normal work continues | Staff capacity for the full population and retained source access |
| Pilot one defined request group first | Limited duplicate entry, one daily comparison and explicit exceptions | Named coordinator and reviewer for the pilot window |
Provider fees, source access and internal staff time are separate lines in the planning record. Ask the account owner to confirm the applicable provider charges and access period, and ask the operations owner to reserve the required staff time.
Select a bounded transition
The owner chooses a pilot containing 12 active requests from one agreed review group. Coordinator C-5 performs the duplicate entry for new pilot activity during three working days. Reviewer R-8 compares the pilot at the end of each day. Other request groups remain solely in the source register and are excluded from the candidate's operational workload.
The source account remains available throughout the pilot and its review. The proposal includes the technical reconciliation output and exception investigation; the organization supplies C-5 and R-8's scheduled time. Any provider access cost for the retained period must be confirmed before the pilot begins. Expansion beyond the 12 requests requires another decision, not an automatic continuation.
The stop condition is specific: if a pilot request cannot be matched reliably or an assigned state differs without an approved explanation, the new register is not accepted as the sole operating source. Staff continue through the documented source process while the discrepancy is investigated. The pilot does not authorize deletion of source history.
Work through a discrepancy
On the second comparison, request Q-58 has the expected identifier but a different assigned reviewer. The exception record identifies both values and the source event that changed the assignment. The owner confirms the intended current reviewer, the supported update is applied to the candidate and R-8 repeats the comparison. Q-58 then agrees, while Q-59's unchanged assignment remains intact.
At the final review, all 12 pilot requests reconcile for the agreed identifiers, assignments and states. The owner accepts the pilot result and approves planning for the next group. This is not yet approval to move every request or close the source account. The limited outcome is exactly what the selected scope was designed to establish.
Compare proposals by the decisions they make possible
The pilot has a known population, named staff, a defined period, retained access, an exception route and a stop condition. Those details allow a buyer to compare the required technical and internal work. A lower import-only figure may still be useful, but it should not be mistaken for the same transition responsibility.
When reviewing your own proposal, ask what staff will do while both systems exist and what evidence permits that overlap to end. Migration work and pricing and scope should make those responsibilities visible before a launch date turns them into urgent, unplanned work.