HSE staff overpaid by €5m in error

THE HSE overpaid staff by more than €5 million last year as a direct result of salary system errors and needed to contact those who initially refused to pay it back through solicitors.

Official figures show that by the end of December health service workers had received €5.043m more in their pay packets than expected.

The overpayments issue means just under €10m has been accidentally paid to doctors, nurses and administrative staff since the start of 2009.

However, Irish Medical News has reported that this money has since been recouped through reductions in the relevant staff members subsequent pay packets.

The issue was first raised last September when it emerged health service management had contacted workers who received the extra money through solicitors as they had declined to hand it back.

An internal HSE audit noted that in the first half of last year the health service was also overpaying staff at a faster rate than they were reclaiming the money.

In the first six months of 2010 the amount owed to the HSE by staff rose by €200,000.

By the end of June, €606,000 was reclaimed from overpaid staff but a further €824,000 had been paid out in error.

The HSE said at the time that as it is the largest employer in the State with more than 100,000 employees, it is difficult to track people who have been overpaid when they move from one HSE region to another.

“An external legal firm will be used for this purpose as it is considered to be the most appropriate mechanism of dealing with the matter,” a spokesman said at the time.

“Notwithstanding the use of an external law firm, the manner in which they now deal with this matter will be managed by the office of legal services.

“The HSE takes the issue of salary overpayments seriously,” the spokesman added.

The situation is not the first time the HSE has faced criticism for inadvertently giving staff a bonus because of administrative errors.

In 2005, a female ancillary worker at a health centre in County Sligo was incorrectly given more than €1m in her pay because of a PPARS system mistake. This payment was handed back.

During the same period, a nurse in Co Cork was overpaid by €3,000. Officials in the midlands found that almost half of a sample of employee pay-slips contained one or more errors.

However, a number of public-health nurses did not receive their allowances from August to September 2004 due to errors.