SAS Staff – SAP HR bulletin update – April 2018 (PDF version)

Members in the Department of Education’s (DoE) 32 schools included in Release 1 of the SAP/HR Payroll rollout have identified a number of serious issues with the system. This has been previously reported to PSA members and you can read the previous bulletin HERE.

Your Union arranged for an urgent meeting with the DoE to discuss your concerns. The meeting took place today – Friday 13 April 2018.

By far, the greatest concern of PSA members in the 32 schools was the suspension of further releases of the new system to schools beyond those already involved in release 1.

The PSA submitted that until a range of system-wide changes as identified and discussed have been implemented and tested we were seeking to have further releases suspended. We also sought additional support for SAS Staff in the 32 schools.

The DoE advised that some of the systems enhancements which will soon be made available to the 32 schools will include:

• the ability for schools to make changes to delegations and to their own Organisational Structure online (for example, nomination of casual staff to the Organisational Structure) with these changes to be immediate.
• DoE has also acknowledged problems experienced in the 32 schools in relation to assignment of salaries to WBS/Internal Orders and committed to improve the process and training content.
• For any subsequent releases DoE will increase the number of change managers, recruit additional SAS staff in support roles, and provide schools with the ability to book “Dial a Friend” as a mentor to support and assist SAS Staff in the implementation of new tasks.

The Department advised it is conducting a further review of the 32 schools and has agreed to share the information gained from this review with PSA.

The PSA thanks members in the 32 schools for providing much valuable feedback to the union. The DoE also acknowledged that the specific system issues identified by members in the 32 will greatly assist in alleviating the problems currently being faced. If members in the 32 schools wish to continue to provide feedback, this will be welcome. Please provide additional feedback to .

The DoE representatives at the meeting are considering our suspension request on further releases beyond the 32 schools and will provide a response on this issue to the PSA as soon as possible. A further meeting with DoE is to take place in the week commencing 23 April 2018.

The PSA commits to continue to work with the DoE in support of SAS Staff to assist in a successful deployment of the new system. The PSA shares the Department’s objectives of a trouble-free rollout of the new SAP/HR Payroll system across the state.

This is an impressive outcome for a common sense approach to resolving the problems of the SAP/HR payroll system in schools and proves that as workers, united we bargain, divided we beg.