Birmingham City Council has said it is setting up a task force and preparing an action plan to deal with protracted problems in its implementation of an Oracle Cloud system for procurement and HR.
This follows reports of long delays and a major cost overrun. According to the BirminghamLive news service, elements of the system have not gone live despite an original launch date of December 2020 and a later one in April 2022, and costs have risen from £19 million to £38 million.
Responding to questions from UKAuthority, a council spokesperson said: “To resolve all issues, an action plan has been drawn up, governance strengthened, and a new task force is being set up, which will be chaired by the chief executive, with progress overseen directly by the leader of the council.”
“In addition, the council is also actively engaging with its external auditors, who have offered to independently review the plans to ensure the implementation of the system is successfully completed.”
According to the BirminghamLive report, the delay has been attributed to a range of issues, including protracted problems with complex customisations, security issues, insufficient training, poorly defined finance processes and a failure to transfer automations from the predecessor SAP system.
It has prompted warnings that the council will not be able to meet its statutory deadline to close its 2022-23 accounts by the end of this month, and come with reports of low morale and complaints from staff within the council’s finance function.
Pointing to positives
But the council pointed out that elements of the system are working and said they have delivered results.
The spokesperson said: “The switch was the first major change in IT system that had been undertaken by the council in more than 20 years.
“Although it is not unusual for such implementations to encounter difficulties, it is clear the transition to the new solution has been particularly challenging – but, importantly, the issues have not affected frontline services for the people of Birmingham.
“There have been notable successes over the last year. For example, the council has made payments to over half a million suppliers since April 2022, with a value of £2.5billion using the new system. However, some elements still require further work to resolve impacts upon day-to-day operations in back office areas such as finance and HR.”
It has also published a guide to using the system for suppliers.
