[Canada] Top public servants opposed ‘big bang’ public service pay switchover

In Canada, a top federal official has announced that fixing the payroll problems caused by Phoenix cost taxpayers more than $5 billion, and they will continue to pay extra to run two public service payroll platforms at once as Ottawa weans itself off the disastrous pay system, CTV News reports.

Alex Benay - associate deputy minister at Public Services and Procurement Canada - stated that the alternative to running the Phoenix system in tandem with its replacement, Dayforce, would have been worse.

Mr Benay reportedly said that the other option was a “big bang” deployment that would have switched approximately 350,000 public servants from the old system to the new Dayforce system all at once.

That was the choice made when the federal government introduced the Phoenix pay system. It led to nearly a decade of mispayments for public servants, major lawsuits and a catastrophic ripple effect for impacted employees.

Mr Benay says taxpayers likely spent about $5.1 billion to process a backlog of Phoenix errors that caused many public servants to be mispaid and sometimes not paid at all.

Mr Benay doesn’t currently have a cost estimate for the switch to Dayforce, but he added that senior government officials have agreed not to repeat the mistakes of nine years ago when Phoenix was brought online.

Source: CTV News

In Canada, a top federal official has announced that fixing the payroll problems caused by Phoenix cost taxpayers more than $5 billion, and they will continue to pay extra to run two public service payroll platforms at once as Ottawa weans itself off the disastrous pay system, CTV News reports.

Alex Benay - associate deputy minister at Public Services and Procurement Canada - stated that the alternative to running the Phoenix system in tandem with its replacement, Dayforce, would have been worse.

Mr Benay reportedly said that the other option was a “big bang” deployment that would have switched approximately 350,000 public servants from the old system to the new Dayforce system all at once.

That was the choice made when the federal government introduced the Phoenix pay system. It led to nearly a decade of mispayments for public servants, major lawsuits and a catastrophic ripple effect for impacted employees.

Mr Benay says taxpayers likely spent about $5.1 billion to process a backlog of Phoenix errors that caused many public servants to be mispaid and sometimes not paid at all.

Mr Benay doesn’t currently have a cost estimate for the switch to Dayforce, but he added that senior government officials have agreed not to repeat the mistakes of nine years ago when Phoenix was brought online.

Source: CTV News