Change Management Policy

Standardised methods and procedures for handling changes to the Skpr hosting platform.

Overview

The objective of Change Management is to ensure that standardised methods and procedures are used to enable beneficial changes while ensuring efficient and prompt handling of all changes to services provided by the Skpr hosting platform. The primary goals of Change Management are to minimise the disruption of services, reduce rollback activities, and ensure clear communication across the platform team and its customers.

Policy

The following section outlines the change management process from submission to closure.

Submitting a Change Request

The Skpr hosting platform uses Jira for ticket tracking purposes.

A change request is submitted when:

• A pull request is created for code changes (if applicable)
• The ticket is updated with a link to the solution e.g. code changes, documentation updates etc.
• The ticket is marked as “Needs Review”.

Reviewing Change Requests

New change items are reviewed during the platform operations team meeting. This meeting is held weekly on Wednesdays.

The Platform Lead is to review each pending change item with the group to ensure all attendees understand the change and its dependencies.

Items will either be agreed upon or deferred to a future meeting, requiring more development or information. Deferring a submission will result in it needing to be resubmitted (marked as “Needs Review”).

Approval

The following table outlines the all categories of change items and which require approval.

Category	Authorization	Timing / Discussion
Routine	Changes carried out as part of routine tasks e.g. security updates.	These changes bypass the approval process and are carried out within our predefined client contract windows.
Emergency	This type of change is usually a response to a failure or error that needs an urgent fix.	Approval required. An emergency meeting will be scheduled to discuss the impact and timings.
Major	A change which results in API breaking changes.	Approval required. Item to be raised during the weekly platform operations team meeting.
Minor	A change that adds functionality and is backwards compatible.	Approval required. Item to be raised during the weekly platform operations team meeting.
Patch	A change that is a backwards compatible bug fix.	Approval is not required. Our standard peer review approach applies.

Closing a Change Request

Change items that were previously approved and deployed are reviewed for closure during the platform operations team meeting.