Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 13 November 2018
81. Deputy Niamh Smyth asked the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection when the issues with the new system for illness benefit will be rectified; if additional staff will be allocated in order to address the matter; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [46755/18]
View answer83. Deputy James Browne asked the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection her plans to address delays affecting illness benefit payments; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [46461/18]
View answer91. Deputy Pearse Doherty asked the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection if illness benefit recipients that have not received payments or are receiving payments sporadically owing to the recent information technology systems failure and that are experiencing ongoing financial hardship will be automatically granted an exceptional needs payment; and if so, if payments in such instances are means-tested. [46637/18]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 81, 83 and 91 together.
My Department has experienced significant difficulties in processing illness benefit payments in recent times and regrettably these difficulties impacted people in a manner that has correctly been described as unacceptable.
This is a matter of great concern to my Department and I am extremely disappointed and deeply embarrassed by our failure to maintain our usual standard of service.
System Change
The root of difficulties lies in the transfer of the illness benefit scheme to the core Business Objects IT platform on 4 August 2018. This transfer had a number of objectives including:
Moving the illness benefit payments off an old IT platform which is approaching end of life to a newer IT platform which is already managing most of my Department’s other payments.
Realising cost savings by eliminating the need for labour intensive data entry and enabling the re-use of existing data already on the Business Objects platform.
Facilitating, in due course, the move from submission of paper medical certificates by people to one whereby an e-certificate is transmitted electronically from the GP to my Department.
Facilitating, also in due course, the move away from certification each week by a GP to a system where a single certificate is provided to cover the entire illness period.
The system change has worked effectively for about 80% of people who claim illness benefit but a number of significant difficulties arose which affected payments.
The Split-Payment Issue
The redesign of the medical certificate enabled the forms to be scanned rather than manually entered into the system. However, approximately 50% of GP practices initially continued to submit ‘old’ form medical certificates. This led to long delays in claim processing on the new system in early August.
These delays were overcome by my Department implementing an ‘automatic certification’ process to ensure that people, including those whose GPs were not submitting the correct certificates, got paid.
While this process did ensure that people received their payments it did result in approximately 15% of recipients receiving a split payment in the period from September to November. People who received split payments were not underpaid as a consequence of this approach; the total amount paid was in accordance with their entitlement.
During this time, my Department also deployed additional staff to process old form certificates received from GP practices. This allowed us to cease the auto-certification process in mid-October and the issue of split payments has since been largely resolved. Approximately 75% of medical certificates now being received are in the correct format. The remaining forms are being processed manually on the day they are received.
Payment Gaps/Missed Payments
The removal of the auto-certification process has belatedly exposed some underlying deficiencies in the design and operation of the new illness benefit system.
The main issue identified relates to the transition from a payment-in-arrears approach to a current-week payment approach, i.e. from a system whereby people are paid their entitlement the week after a period of certification, to one where they are paid during the week of certification. This leaves very little tolerance for late receipt of certificates once a claim is in payment. This is causing significant uncertainty for people.
The new system also has very tightly defined rules which must be satisfied before a claim and a certificate can be accepted and processed. Although these rules are valid in principle, they are leading to payments being delayed for reasons that would not have been applied under the legacy system.
Measures Taken to Address The Payment Issues
My Department is taking three main steps to resolve the issues just described.
First we have deployed additional staff to process the tasks and respond to enquiries arising from the tight application of scheme rules by the new system.
Second, we have developed some new IT routines or ‘workarounds’ that in effect build in a seven day buffer to address the payment gap issue and automate the processing of tasks to ensure a faster flow-through to payments.
Third we are reviewing the design rules in the system, including the payment in the current week rule, and will modify the system to afford greater flexibility in processing of claims and certificates.
In addition, my Department continues to engage with the medical profession regarding the implementation of e-certification and single / closed certification. These measures will, in time, lead to better service for people.
My Department has also allocated additional managers to take responsibility for the programme of work just set out. This management team includes a full time assistant secretary and additional staff at Principal, Assistant Principal and Higher Executive Officer level.
As a consequence of the measures just described, people who are due a payment and whose certificates and claims are in order should now receive their payment entitlement. Payment volumes were restored to normal levels last week and are being monitored on a daily basis to ensure that they remain at this level. Any further issues that may arise will be quickly identified and any further remedial action that may be required will be taken.
In stating this it is important to note there are always cases, and were always such cases under the old system, where people’s payments are legitimately stopped or paused for a variety of reasons. These types of issues will always remain and would normally be dealt with via our helpline number.
Other Issues/Measures
In addition to these system issues, my Department acknowledges that it did not communicate effectively with people in advance of the new system coming into effect, nor in the immediate post implementation period. While my Secretary General did write to all people in receipt of illness benefit some weeks ago to apologise for the difficulties and to advise of other supports available this communication was, I accept, too little, too late and was of limited comfort to those people affected.
Our experience with the illness benefit transfer has been a salutary reminder that the longer term impact of short-term remedial actions, taken with the best intentions when unanticipated issues arise or failures occur, must be carefully thought through before implementation.
In order to ensure that lessons are identified and learned from this experience, my Secretary General has commissioned an independent review of this project to be undertaken by a retired Revenue Commissioner. It is expected that it will be delivered by the end of the year and its findings will inform our approach to future system and process changes.
Conclusion
As I have already said my Department sincerely regrets and is deeply embarrassed by the difficulties recently encountered by people in receipt of illness benefit.
