EXE Group provides the tools and knowledge you need to quickly establish your software legality position, including... · PC audit software · PC auditing services · Licence management software · Software licence reconciliation services

EXE Group have enough experience on tap to help you complete the Audit Return Form with confidence.

EXE Group provide PC hardware and software auditing services to determine your current licence compliance situation - ensuring your organisation has a working anti piracy policy.

Where do I start?

Click “Contact us” to find out more about the BSA's Audit Return Form and EXE Group’s PC auditing and licence compliance services.

However, according to our audit experiences, we recommend the following approach to promote and monitor the legality of software as a less resource-intensive alternative to en-masse software audit.

• Departments to publicize the policy of software legality to all PC users.

• Departments to keep records of all their software purchases and usage of site-licensed software. This information should be kept in a departmental registry and updated by an administrator who is preferably not a computer support person (for example, a departmental executive assistant). Many departments do this already but once this process is started, even in departments where information is lacking or absent, rigorously following this approach will eventually bring matters into line.

• Every PC to be easily identifiable by unique reference.

• Every PC to have an associated set of certificates, kept (in hardcopy form) by the person responsible for the system. A certificate would be a physical token that a particular piece of software is licensed for use on that machine. Certificates would be issued by or surrendered to the administrator as software is installed or deleted on the PC.

• Periodic spot-checks of a small number of systems at random to be performed to verify that all software accessible from the machine has a corresponding certificate and to reinforce the idea of "owning responsibility" for software.

• Appropriate measures in the event that any installed software is found to be improperly licensed.

In practise, PC software certificates would carry a reference number, issued by the departmental administrator. This might be the departmental order number relating to the purchase of the software license, or perhaps a code referring to some other certificate of ownership (e.g. a Microsoft Select certificate number, as found on license certificates supplied by the Computing Service). For software supplied at no charge to departments under site-license from the Computing Service, issuing of certificates by administrators would be optional. Where a charge is made for a site-licensed package, a certificate should be issued.