How antiquated IT led to defence payroll bungle

PUNE, INDIA: Come April and the defence kangaroos have been advised to put in fresh IT in their belly bags after a big payroll bungle which has even led to calls for Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon to be sacked.

The botch-up as per some Australian News reports involved many goof-ups. Examples pointed out include a total of 102 special forces soldiers had money deducted from their pay with $1743.29 being the most taken from a single soldier. Three soldiers received payslips showing zero pay. The incident caused many members and families of Special Forces inconvenience including those who continue to face debt recovery action that was ordered to be ceased long before in a directive in Oct 2008.

Next followed a KPMG independent audit of the implementation of Defence Force Remuneration Tribunal determination of Special Forces Pay, Canberra, Australia that came out with some interesting findings.

Its review of the matter noted that the department has aging systems which while working well at managing the complexity of Defence payroll arrangements are nonethelss facing vendor support issues.

The report by Nick Baker and Ken Drover, partners at KPMG, also recommended IT revamp for simplification of allowance and pay structures. It has specifically asked to implement IT reform along with process reform for shared service delivery.

The KPMG report attributed the mess-up to antiquated IT systems were antiquated, among other factors like poorly trained staff and unwiledy payroll system.

The audit was ordered by Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon after he was unable to get assurances from Defence that debt-recovery action had been stopped in connection with the overpayment of allowances to elite SAS soldiers, according to a media report.

In the latest update, Department of Defence has released a reformed pay system that incorporates revised salaries and allowances for servicemen and women totalling $2.4 billion over the next 10 years.