Novopay shows steady performance for latest pay periods

Novopay is described as maintaining a steady performance, following the release of the results of the latest Novopay complaints reports.

“Both pay periods were well within the 0.5 per cent acceptable steady state error rate as defined by the Novopay technical review,” Steven Joyce, Minister Responsible for Novopay says.

For Pay Period 3 (paid 30 April), 87,571 people were paid a total of $165.44 million. Complaints and notifications were received regarding 0.11% of staff across New Zealand, with eight staff notified as not paid, 30 were overpaid, and 55 underpaid. There were a total of 55 schools with affected staff, which is 2.27% of schools in the payroll system.

For Pay Period 4 (paid 14 May), 85,449 people were paid a total of $165.83 million. Complaints and notifications were received regarding 0.18% of staff across New Zealand, with 27 staff notified as not paid, 46 were overpaid, and 84 underpaid. There were a total of 138 schools with affected staff, which is 5.70% of schools in the payroll system.

“The performance of Pay Period 4 would’ve been better if 39 principals had received a leadership payment allowance they were meant to be receiving,” Joyce comments. “This mistake came about due to a one-off data entry error. These principals will receive the allowance payment in the next fortnightly pay.”

As at 27 April 2014 there were 18,058 overpayments worth $18.8 million that date back to Novopay’s introduction. Repayments have been made for more than half the debt, with the current repayment rate around $1 million a month. A further $167,992 of debt, where each individual debt was under $100, has been written off.

Further improvements planned include the delivery of the school payroll system, incorporating the revision of the service centre model and the resolving of outstanding overpayments and leave balances.

Processes around school annual accounts that were affected by Novopay errors are being improved, with sector and school feedback being used to assist this, with the Ministry of Education providing additional support.

Mulitple issues on each ticket continue to complicate the resolution of leave balances. Outstanding tickets have reduced from around 5000 in November 2013, to 3573 currently.