Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 15 January 2019
1104. Deputy John Brady asked the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection her plans to use the same new automated system recently put in place for illness benefit for other social welfare payments; the payments in this regard; when this is planned for; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [1392/19]
View answerThe Department has acknowledged that difficulties arose in delivery of Illness Benefit payments in Autumn 2018, when the Department transferred administration of the Illness Benefit scheme from an old ICT system to its strategic ICT platform on 4 August 2018.
The difficulties that arose were limited to the operation of Illness Benefit and have been addressed by the Department as a matter of priority. Other schemes supported by the same platform continued to operate as normal throughout the Autumn.
This ICT platform already manages most of the Department’s scheme payments and it processes approximately 1.3 million of the Department’s 1.6 million weekly scheme payments.
The Department continues to engage in an on-going programme of business process and ICT service delivery modernisation with the aim of improving both customer service and operational efficiency.
