In the case of the Agresso debacle readers have been quick to point out that she has not followed through on this mess.
Can someone with knowledge of the situation write to the Dame so we can all understand more?
She has the impression Agresso has now been re-branded as Unit 14(Orwellian) and is in the hands of some Dutch company
NPB needs to get a grip, regain control of this Borough and its standards and drop the Tri Borough. For the first time in its history Kensington's standards are at rock bottom and on par with some of the most ill run Boroughs in London.
ReplyDeleteThis is a tri-borough initiative intended to “save money” and be “more efficient”. It takes all the finance and human resources data of all three councils, co-ordinates them, puts them all into a new database and IT programme – and then bingo – it will conveniently pay every creditor of each borough the correct amount and on time. It has been contracted out to BT – without any pilot to see if it would actually work. BT were 18 months delivering the programme and it finally went live in April. Since then many staff, especially in schools and nurseries, have had to be paid by cash. Council tenants’ rent accounts have gone haywire because rent payments are being credited to the wrong accounts; providers of goods and services are not being paid or are being paid the wrong amount. Some small traders are at their wits’ end and at least one is facing eviction because she cannot pay the rent on her premises. The councils say that all the problems “may” be resolved by the end of October – in their dreams, bless ’em. A more crass example of the “benefits” of tri-borough would be hard to find.
ReplyDeleteThe council's internal blurb states:
ReplyDelete"The Managed Services System – Agresso – integrates finance and HR for the three councils in one structure. The benefits of this system in terms of transparency, control and accountability will be substantial. To work effectively, the system must use an accurate organisational structure.
Unfortunately, there are a large number of errors within the Agresso organisation structure. These are the result of a variety of factors: bringing together three councils, integrating legacy structures that were previously separate whilst also having to deal with some post data load issues which arose. It is also acknowledged that there were a number of organisational changes which hadn’t been captured at the cut-off point.
The impact of this is significant. If you have an incorrect structure, it may mean that your approvals will go to the wrong people, that you won’t have the access rights that you should have, so won’t be able to carry out certain functions or processes or that the budgets you manage don’t include your full costings.