MPs voice CMS2 concerns

Committee says Jobcentre Plus not acknowledging full extent of problem

Jobcentre Plus executives are failing to acknowledge the full extent of problems with the Customer Management System (CMS2), says an influential House of Commons committee.

The Work and Pensions Select Committee has requested further information about CMS2, following a meeting earlier this month with Jobcentre Plus (JC+) chief executive Leslie Strathie, and chief information officer Kevin Bone.

‘My feeling is that you are simply not acknowledging the problems that staff have identified, that organisations such as the Citizens Advice Bureau have identified, and that need to be addressed,’ said committee member Greg Mulholland MP.

Computing has highlighted considerable problems caused by CMS, and the delay and distress to people trying to claim benefits.

Some claimants have had to wait as long as two months for their first payment (Computing, 19 October); in one area in August just eight per cent of incoming application calls were answered (Computing, 29 September); and only two of the 23 CMS-enabled contact centres were graded as acceptable (Computing, 14 September).

JC+ staff say both the business process and the software itself are badly-designed, causing hold-ups at every link in the chain.

Strathie admitted to the committee that some contact centres have suffered call backlogs and reverted to clerical procedures, as reported in Computing in September. But Bone said that the system itself works well. ‘I think CMS has been a huge success for us,’ he said.

The committee has requested a report addressing CMS in detail.

‘Technology is supposed to be there to aid the delivery of public services but there seem to be a number of question marks about whether that is really the case, and that is worrying,’ Mulholland told Computing.

‘From the evidence presented to the committee, JC+ does not seem to be acknowledging the problems with the system.’

A JC+ source with personal experience of the system said: ‘CMS has been a total disaster and it is significant that only when it was suspended did we start offering a decent service to the public again. The trouble is a combination of things – IT problems, staffing shortages and lack of training.’