The Ministry of Defence’s (MoD’s) £100m next-generation human resources (HR) system will start to be rolled out to the army’s 140,000 employees this month.

The Joint Personnel Administration (JPA) programme is a self-service system providing military staff with secure online access to HR functions such as posting details, expenses and pay statements.

Once in use by all three services – the army, air force and navy – JPA is expected to save more than £100m per year in administration costs. It will include 40 separate functions, all of which were previously done on paper.

The defence environment is particularly challenging, says MoD chief information officer John Taylor. ‘Self-service HR in a static environment is quite easy, but in an environment with lots of military personnel moving around between barracks, training and theatre we have to ensure accessible infrastructure provision enables them to continuously access their details,’ he said.

‘The army is the biggest challenge because we have to get the infrastructure out to some 550 locations to support administrative HR staff and service people.

‘It will be quite a change for the army because it has not had a ubiquitous IT infrastructure until now,’ he said.

The RAF went live on JPA in March last year, followed by the Royal Navy in November. The army rollout is expected to be complete by July.

Though JPA was conceived before Whitehall’s efficiency targets were established, the programme will make a considerable contribution, says Taylor.

‘The administration of looking after 140,000 people is not straightforward and taking a corporate approach across all three services gives us an opportunity to streamline processes,’ he said.