Platform Evolution
Assessment run-2026-07-27-1 · 213 of 213 repos assessed
Repos / vcc-service

vcc-service

Virtual credit card (VCC) issuing and reconciliation service - a .NET 8 Web API plus a legacy .NET Framework WCF host and an SSDT database, dispatching card requests to the WEX, eNett and Conferma provider APIs.

57 · ambermediumkernelOn-premZDD: a long roadapi

Health score

57

0 to 100 across seven weighted factors; nothing is hidden. Green is 75 and above, amber 50 to 74, red below 50. How scoring works.


Runtime currency / 25
0
.NET Framework, out of mainstream support
Legacy transport / 15
2
Hosts WCF or SOAP endpoints with no successor on modern .NET
Test posture / 15
15
Good test coverage
Security hygiene / 15
15
No credentials found in source
Dangerous coupling / 15
11
depends on pinning component(s): application-framework, mail-service, mailtemplate-service
Activity / 10
10
Actively maintained
Deployment hygiene / 5
5
CI in place
Health over time
2026-07-24 (run-2026-07-24-1): 572026-07-27 (run-2026-07-27-1): 57
No change since 2026-07-24 (57 to 57).

Facts

Languagescsharp
FrameworksASP.NET Core 8, WCF, MediatR, Serilog
Runtimes.NET 8, .NET Framework 4.7.2
Tests / CIgood / CI in place
Last commit2026-07-24
OwnerOwner unknown (mapping to be curated)
DomainPayments and finance (system generated; curate in repo-owners.json to override)
Product areaPhenix
HostedOn-prem Deployed to our own machines
  • Release "\finance\vcc\VirtualCreditCard (VCC) Database": QA: deployment-group phase (agents on our own machines)
  • Release "\finance\vcc\VirtualCreditCard (VCC) Database": Staging: deployment-group phase (agents on our own machines)
  • Release "\finance\vcc\VirtualCreditCard (VCC) Database": Production: deployment-group phase (agents on our own machines)
  • Release "\finance\vcc\VirtualCreditCard (VCC) Database": Training: deployment-group phase (agents on our own machines)
  • Release "\finance\vcc\vcc-service (Webapi)": Staging: deployment-group phase (agents on our own machines)
Releases5 release pipeline(s): \finance\vcc\VirtualCreditCard (VCC) Database; \finance\vcc\vcc-service (Webapi); \finance\vcc\vcc-service (Webapi) - Stealth; \finance\vcc\vcc-service-wcf; \finance\vcc\vcc-service-wcf Stealth
Integrationrest, wcf, soap, redis-streams
SourceOpen in Azure DevOps

Risk flags

Each flag links to its glossary definition.

Dependencies in context

Laying out the graph…
greenamberreddata store (square, dashed link)Node size follows fan-in. Click any node to open it.

Entanglement

kernel Bound into the core by 2 mechanism(s).

Detaches when its pinning dependencies are cut or multi-targeted (application-framework, mail-service, mailtemplate-service); and when its WCF surface gains a modern interface or its WCF calls move to one.

Capability duplication

Part of the Virtual credit cards family (survivor): Owns the VirtualCreditCard database but its WCF host calls eNett SOAP directly

Migration playbooks

Generated from this repo's assessment data: what is feasible, what blocks it, and the steps in order. Ratings: green means actionable now, amber means sequence other work first, red means blocked, grey means not applicable.

ZDD adoption

A long road

Technically eligible one day, but the blockers are structural: hosted WCF or SOAP contracts that cannot run two versions at once, or heavy legacy coupling. Sequence the modernisation work first. Hosts WCF or SOAP endpoints: strict serialization contracts cannot safely run two versions at once (the shared-enum trap). End-of-life runtime compounds the work.

Dependencies and gotchas
  • 7 system(s) depend on this repo; during a rolling deploy they will talk to old and new versions at once, so responses must stay compatible
  • Serialized state or messages in flight (Redis or queues): new code must deserialize objects written by the previous version
Steps
  1. Adopt the four-stage discipline from the ZDD engineering standard: pre-deployment compatibility, deployment, feature activation behind a flag, post-release cleanup.
  2. Make every change dual-version safe: backwards-compatible APIs (new major version for breaking wire changes), expand and contract for any schema change, and consumers tolerant of unknown fields.
  3. Audit serialized data: anything in Redis, queues or shared caches must deserialize cleanly across adjacent versions.
  4. Wrap behaviour changes in feature flags so code deploys dark and release becomes a business decision, not a deployment event.
  5. Route deployments through the Workflow Engine's automated drain, deploy, health-check, return cycle (the path proven by the first automated production run in mid-2026).
  6. Verify with area-scoped regression rather than the whole-platform cycle, and watch error rates after rollout with automated rollback on alert.

SQL Server exit

Blocked by a shared database

sqlserver:VirtualCreditCard is shared, so this system cannot change engine on its own: every sharer moves in convoy. Either agree the move with all sharers as one programme, or first split this system's data out behind an owned API, then follow the steps below.

Blockers
Steps
  1. Inventory the schema and query surface of sqlserver:VirtualCreditCard, sqlserver:vcc_api_logs: tables, stored procedures, triggers, cross-database joins and anything else engine-specific.
  2. Confirm the target: PostgreSQL (relational model; keep transactions and joins, swap the engine).
  3. Replatform to modern .NET first (see the recommended actions): current PostgreSQL and MongoDB drivers and EF Core providers target modern .NET, and doing one risky change at a time is cheaper than doing two.
  4. Data access is not through an ORM, so port the SQL by hand: translate T-SQL constructs, replace stored procedures with application code or target-native equivalents, and add integration tests around the queries that matter first.
  5. Stand up the target alongside SQL Server, backfill with an ETL pass (pgloader or an export/import job), then dual-write or replicate until parity is proven.
  6. Move reads to the target, watch correctness and latency, then cut writes over and keep SQL Server read-only until confidence is earned.
  7. Decommission the SQL Server database and remove the connection strings and firewall paths that pointed at it.

Containerisation

Feasible after replatforming

Appropriate eventually, but not from here: the legacy runtime and the hosted WCF surface both have to go first, and that work is already in this repo's recommended actions.

Blockers
Steps
  1. Replatform to modern .NET first (see the recommended actions), replacing the hosted WCF/SOAP surface with REST, gRPC or messaging so consumers can follow. Containerising then becomes routine.
  2. Add a Dockerfile and make the app read all configuration from environment variables and the secrets manager, never from machine-local files.
  3. Log to stdout and expose a health check endpoint so ECS can supervise it.
  4. Adopt the shared ci.yml pipeline template with the container parameters (awsRegion, containerAfterBuild, ecsTerraformRepo), which is exactly how the estate's existing AWS services deploy.
  5. Define the service in the Terraform repo, deploy to a non-production environment, then shift traffic and disarm the deployment-group release pipeline.

Recommended actions

Replatform vcc-service to modern .NET

Runs on .NET 8, .NET Framework 4.7.2, out of mainstream support. Blocked until stage 2 cuts: application-framework, mail-service, mailtemplate-service.

Impact: Unblocks 7 dependent system(s)

proposed

Assessment notes

vcc-service

Purpose

Core virtual-credit-card system for finance: agents and back-office systems request VCCs for supplier payments, and the service issues cards through provider APIs (WEX, eNett, Conferma), records requests/transactions, and reconciles provider settlement transactions against purchase orders (creating purchase invoices and supplier payments). A canned-response provider fakes cards in test environments.

Tech stack

Split estate in one repo: the newer Web API (TC.VirtualCreditCard.Api) is ASP.NET Core on .NET 8 with MediatR, Serilog, FluentValidation, NSwag/Swashbuckle, PhenixAuth and TC.Streams Redis stream processing; the legacy TC.VirtualCreditCard.ServiceHost is a .NET Framework 4.7.2 IIS-hosted WCF service (SimpleInjector.Integration.Wcf) exposing basicHttp/wsHttp endpoints for PhenixRetail, AdminStudio, QuoteSystem and Authorisation consumers. Shared libraries multi-target net462/netstandard2.0. db/VirtualCreditCard is an SSDT database project.

Deployment

prod_application with 5 releases across three deployables: vcc-service (Webapi), vcc-service-wcf and VirtualCreditCard (VCC) Database build pipelines, released under \finance\vcc\ (Webapi + Stealth, WCF + Stealth, Database). YAML pipelines exist in the repo (src/Webapi/build.yml, build-vcc-wcf.yml, build-vcc.db.yml) using shared azure-pipelines-templates. Also publishes the TC.VirtualCreditCard.Api.Client NuGet package.

Dependencies

Internal: dispatches card requests to vccprovider-wex, vccprovider-enett and vccprovider-conferma via ConnectionBroker HTTP targets (VccProviderWex etc.); TC.ConnectionBroker suite, TC.Exceptions, TC.Phenix.ApplicationFramework, TC.Mail/TC.Mail.Template service clients (mail-service / mailtemplate-service) and TC.UserAccount contracts (backoffice-useraccount-service). External: the legacy WCF host still calls eNett's vNett SOAP service directly (TC.VirtualCreditCard.VNettService with Live/Demo bindings).

Data stores

SQL Server VirtualCreditCard database (own SSDT project, ADO/Dapper data access) plus a vcc_api_logs request/response logging database; Redis is used for stream processing and caching in the Web API.

Integration points

REST (versioned Web API with OpenAPI), legacy WCF endpoints consumed by Phenix Retail, AdminStudio and the quote system, outbound SOAP to eNett vNett, and Redis streams for reconciliation/event processing.

Code health

Good: ten test projects (~267 test files) spanning unit, API and SpecFlow/NUnit integration tests with coverlet coverage; informative README plus docs/reconciliation.md; actively developed (last commit 2026-07-24). Nerdbank.GitVersioning for versioning.

Modernisation risks

The Web API side is already modern .NET 8, but the WCF service host is .NET Framework 4.7.2 and load-bearing for Phenix Retail/AdminStudio/QuoteSystem callers - retiring it requires migrating those consumers off WCF. The direct vNett SOAP dependency duplicates the vccprovider-enett path and ties the legacy host to a provider integration. Three deployables and mixed runtimes in one repo add release complexity for a production-critical finance system.