College staff face shared payroll

A shared payroll system for over 60,000 third-level workers is being considered to help colleges focus more on teaching and research.

Payroll is the first function in which the possibility of shared services in higher education is being examined by the Department of Education, as part of a wider Government initiative to increase efficiency across the public sector.

The 27 colleges whose pay systems are being looked at currently have 60,490 employees and people paid for part-time or contract work. Each separately uses one of five different payroll systems. The same system is used by the seven universities and the 14 institutes of technology, supported at 13 of the institutes by a second payroll application.

The department also wants payroll at four teacher-training colleges – Mary Immaculate in Limerick, St Patrick’s and Mater Dei in Dublin, and St Angela’s in Sligo – as well as the National College of Art & Design and Royal Irish Academy to be considered. It wants a detailed business case and cost benefit analysis carried out, to examine up to five payroll options, including shared services and external delivery.

“There is an opportunity for the higher education sector to focus on their core mission – the provision of quality third level education and research to the community by investigating the provision of certain services through a shared service model,” says the department’s document seeking tenders for the job.

The department’s own payroll system has come in for criticism recently, with thousands of teachers forced to wait until at least mid-February for salary increases they were due last month.