The MoD’s
Joint Personnel Administration programme is the latest
government IT project to hit the headlines for poor
performance.
The consequences are that some members of the armed forces have
been underpaid because of management and software problems at the
Ministry.
The system held incorrect personal data for between 5% and 10%
of all military staff, and there were insufficient controls to
prevent errors. The problems meant some staff, including serving
soldiers in Afghanistan, were underpaid.
In 2007, 51,000 wage packets were underpaid. But supplier EDS
said 31,000 of these were only £3 short and were repaid the
following month.
Management troubleshooter Colin Beveridge said he is
“gobsmacked” by this latest failure. “It is a familiar, but still
frightening, story” he said.
The £245m project was meant to improve the administrative
support provided to members of the armed services. It is still on
track to save the MoD £100m a year.
It replaced several separate payroll systems and career
management systems, but poor development and implementation led to
big problems for the staff it was supposed to help.
Flawed formulation
The main problem with the JPA was its formulation, a
report by
the Defence Select Committee said.
When developing the system, the MoD did not focus enough on the
requirements for financial reporting or the need for management
information data, so staff cannot get the information they
need.
“We consider this to be a basic and fundamental error which is
unacceptable on a project of this scale and importance,” the
Defence Committee’s report said.
An internal review was commissioned after a
report by the National Audit Office, which highlighted problems
with the system.
In addition to the Ministry’s failure to make sure the system
delivered basic financial reporting requirements, the report found
the programme was considered an HR project and did not sufficiently
involve finance staff in its development. Officials at the MoD
relied too heavily on supplier EDS to advise it of the controls
needed, despite the fact that EDS did not have a clear
understanding of what the MoD required. The contract was awarded to
EDS without an open tender, which the MPs also criticised.
MoD finance director Trevor Woolley told MPs, “We replaced a
manual system with an automated system. In a manual system there
are lots of opportunities for manual intervention if it looks as if
a payment is being made at the wrong level or to the wrong person.
The automated system we have in JPA does not have that same level
of control and the same level of evidence that the right payments
have been made to the right people.”
The MoD has so far demanded half a million pounds from EDS as a
fine for “service delivery failures”, but the remaining £1.8m of
extra costs will be absorbed by the public purse.
Ongoing problems
And the problems have not stopped yet. Although the MoD has put
considerable effort into improving the system, the National Audit
Office has said there is still more to do and any early benefits of
the system will have been lost.
Beveridge said, “Over the past five or six years, the government
has placed too much confidence in so-called ‘new technology’ to
achieve ambitious cost savings. Many of these initiatives, however,
create not only massive disappointment but also huge and unexpected
costs, due to an apparent inability of departments and major
suppliers to deliver the goods.”
He pointed out that the MoD’s payroll system was effectively
computerised in the 1970s. “So why, nearly 30 years later, can’t
the MOD get things right now?”
A spokesman for EDS said, “The NAO qualified the MOD accounts as
a result of issues around the accounting systems in JPA. We are
working with the MOD and NAO to address these issues as a matter of
urgency.
“The system has benefits for users and was delivered on time and
on budget to 300,000 users between 2006 and 2007.”
“While there were some initial problems with user
familiarisation with the new system and training, enhanced training
has meant that in a survey of armed forces in November 2008, 81%
said they were satisfied with the way they used the JPA system and
85% were satisfied with the services the Service Personnel and
Veterans Agency provides,” he said.
EDS response
EDS issued the following statement to Computer Weekly:
During the period covered by the report (2007/2008) the accuracy
of wage payments was 99.47%. The report highlights that 51,000 wage
packets were short in 2007, however it should be noted that 31,0000
of these cases related to a single incident where £3.00 was
deducted in error from pay packets. This was identified and
corrected the following month.
The programme will achieve savings of £100m per year and is on
track to do so. Such savings free up resources to be devoted to
front line services.
There are also benefits for users. The 300,000 self-service
users can view pay slips, submit on-line expenses and change
personal details directly via the system, removing the need to go
through unit HR teams and resulting in a faster service. The system
also provides enhanced HR capabilities. For example, casualty
information is now entered direct onto the system from operational
theatres and is fed within seconds to the SPVA’s Joint Casualty and
Compassionate Centre, allowing immediate family liaison
arrangements to be made.
The NAO qualified the MOD accounts as a result of issues around
accounting systems in JPA. We are working with the MOD and NAO to
address these issues as a matter of urgency.
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