NHSE calls in consultants to turn around ‘critical’ finance system

4 Comments

Deloitte working on eight-week contract to reset critical national IT project
The “Integrated Single Financial Environment” should deliver a new single accounting and finance system for the NHS
But the project has been hit with delays and now consultants have been brought in to reset the project

NHS England has called in management consultants to turn around the delivery of “business critical” new software after a review found project plans and timelines were “insufficient”.

Deloitte was awarded a £99,000 contract to provide an eight-week “reset” of the “integrated single financial environment” programme, running from 11 March to 7 June, according to procurement documents published last week.

NHS Shared Business Services currently runs a single accounting system. In December 2022 it was awarded a £108m contract over more than eight years to deliver “a new, upgraded, cloud-based solution” by April 2024, when the current service contract expires.

In November last year HSJ revealed this delivery had been put back by at least three and up to six months. Deloitte have now been called in to help reset the project after a “stage gate review” highlighted problems with its governance, timelines and management.

According to the procurement documents, the review found the “program delivery model and resourcing may be insufficient to deliver a programme of this size and scale. Roles and responsibilities on the program are not clear and need to be clarified. This includes having a program [sic] director role with decision-making authority”.

It also said: “The testing timelines have been identified as being aggressive with little to no contingency. Several elements of the delivery plan are insufficient and don’t include the level of detail required in a program of this size”.

The ISFE is “national critical infrastructure”, the documents add, echoing remarks made by Amanda Pritchard in December 2022 when the organisation awarded the new contract to NHS SBS. The NHSE chief executivesaid the project was “business critical” to the NHS.

In April 2023 NHS SBS announced it had picked Oracle Fusion Cloud Enterprise Resource Planning to build the new system.

In November 2023 the NHSE-NHS SBS joint programme team “decided to invest more time to ensure the service, system and all NHS organisations are in a strong operationally-ready position prior to transition”.

NHSE and Deloitte declined to comment. A spokesperson for NHS SBS said: “As this short piece of work has been commissioned by NHS England, it is for them to comment.”

HSJ Virtual Care Forum | 27 June 2024, London

Join 120+ senior primary, secondary and social care professionals, both an organisation and system level at the HSJ Virtual Care Forum , on 27 June 2024 in London.

This inaugural event will provide a platform to discuss how to maximise performance of the national virtual ward rollout and look beyond it to proactively meet the evolving demands of the system and the patient. Discussions will focus on both short-term strategies to build and scale virtual services and the long term preventative strategies. With NHS England putting virtual ward firmly in the spotlight, there are high expectations of delivery.

Register your place to explore best practices in virtual models throughout the system, build confidence in this new way of working and network with all key stakeholders involved in the development of these new services. It is through this critical collective collaboration that you will find the right solution for your system to deliver high-quality, clinically safe care pathways that optimise patient outcomes. 

To find out more information and to secure your place, click here.