Agenda item

The Pension Administration Lead will present an “immediate payments” update following transfer of the fund payment process to Oracle.

James Franklin, Pension Administration Lead, presented an “immediate payments” update to the Board following the transfer of the Fund payment process to Oracle.

Officers began by providing a brief background to the report as per Paragraphs 2 to 5, before moving on to explaining the issues experienced with member and supplier payments and accounting as a result of the transition to Oracle as per Paragraphs 6 to 11. Officers emphasised that Fund officers sought to liaise with the Evolve Team with regard to member communications and immediate payment loading arrangements to Oracle ahead of its launch, but due to time constraints faced by the Evolve Team, they were unable to respond to officers until 3 days before the official launch date. Despite this, as the Altair Immediate Payments and Integrated System went live on 8 December 2023, the Fund was in control of its own payments, thus reducing the risk of incorrect or duplicate payments and improving the processing time of payment tasks.

It was stressed that as the payroll system was split from the initial Oracle implementation and was planned to be launched in April 2024, officers felt that there were significant risks to the operations of the Fund during that transition which would be further exacerbated by the annual pensions increase exercise occurring at the same time. As such, officers were requesting information on timings and resource requirement from the Evolve Team to ensure adequate time to load and test data before and during the migration to minimise the risk of a second and more significant service disruption.

Members expressed concerns as to the potential impacts to the Fund during the imminent payroll integration and sought further clarity on Bullet Point B of Paragraph 6. In response, officers confirmed that the Fund was not the only affected service area during the initial transition and that senior officers within the Council were aware of the impact on the Fund. The additional administration work necessary in order to rectify the issues, and the subsequent impact on other Fund services, was discussed, with officers highlighting that as the Council were experiencing similar resourcing issues to that of the Fund, additional support from the Evolve Team would be difficult to negotiate.

Councillor Richard Britton, Chairman of the Wiltshire Pension Fund Committee (WPFC), raised his concerns on the matter and stated that he had liaised with the Chairman of the Evolve Task Group and had requested assurance from senior Council officers that they were aware of the impact on the Fund, and of Fund requirements moving forward. Cllr Britton noted that he was not satisfied with the response received and was concerned as to the risk to the Fund if the payroll integration were to go ahead come April 2024. Members echoed Cllr Britton’s concerns and unanimously agreed with the Chairman’s suggestion of requesting that a senior officer attend the next meeting of the WPFC with a report outlining a response to the issues raised by Board Members.

At the conclusion of the discussion, it was then:

Resolved:

The Board recommended that the Wiltshire Pension Fund Committee agree to request that the Corporate Director (or Director) responsible for the Evolve Team arrange for a report to be produced for submission and presentation to the 28 March 2024 meeting of the Wiltshire Pension Fund Committee which provides, at least:

·       An explanation of why the upload templates and spreadsheets for the Immediate Payments system failed, and why the BACs file created for loading into Oracle was not updated for all members, leading to duplicate payments of £228,000, of which, at the time of the Board meeting, £153,000 remained outstanding.

·       A detailed timetable, including the expected resource requirements expected to be input by Pension Fund officers, for the transfer of the Pension’s payroll to the Oracle system.

·       Details of the testing that has been completed to date and any outstanding testing due to be completed, including all input and upload processes, prior to the transfer of the Pension’s payroll to the Oracle system.

·       Details of the training, and training documentation, that has been provided to relevant Pension Officers by the EVOLVE team, and the level of on-going support available to pension officers if needed.

·       Proposed parallel running arrangements.

·       An update on any payrolls that have already been moved to Oracle and a “lessons learned” analysis based on any major problems that have arisen.

·       An assessment of risk, from an IT expert, of transferring the Pension’s payroll to the Oracle system in April 2024, at the same time as the pensions increase exercise.