The city and the software provider, PCI, have since hit restart and are looking to Jan. 3 as their next go-live date.
“That’s our goal,” said Debbie George, the city’s chief of staff.
Successfully replacing a 20-year-old tax revenue and billing system is still a priority, city officials said. The city has paid more than $340,000 to get the project back on track.
An audit last summer highlighted areas for improvement, including the need for a full-time project manager to help guide the process.
“It’s probably the most complex software implementation that we as a city have done,” George said, because it involves so many different departments and functions, as well as very tight deadlines.
In 2010, the city purchased software from PCI LLC of Tampa, Fla. The intent was to streamline the city’s financial transactions, with sources of billing and revenue processed in the new software flowing automatically into its financial-accounting software. The conversion goal was 2012.
A small percentage of miscellaneous revenue was eventually handled through PCI. But by 2015, the city had spent roughly $640,000 and still hadn’t been able to switch over billing and payment processing of real estate and personal property taxes. Errors cropped up as well.
“The information flowing to the general ledger was the item that stopped us last time – stopped us cold,” George added of data errors that were being transmitted into the finance department’s master balance sheet. The project was halted in January 2015 and appeared on the verge of collapse.
But everyone came back to the table to try to work out a solution, George said. An independent evaluation of the project by accounting firm Cherry Bekaert was completed last summer, for which the city paid nearly $51,000.
The firm recommended devoting more resources to the effort, so Susan Gard-Smith of Slait Consulting was hired as project manager for $138,278 in September.
“Susan was able to come in and get her arms around it,” George said. “We have a central point of communication now.”
An amended contract signed by Patrick Roberts and Alastair Main, PCI’s president and CEO, in January shows annual maintenance payments of $125,000 over three years to be paid by the city to cover the cost of the project’s completion.
As part of the agreement, the city got the latest version of the software in early April. George said that meant starting over practically from scratch.
Software testing is now under way, as well as data conversion in the offices of the commissioner of the revenue and real estate assessor. Real estate, business and personal property taxes – the biggest fish and most complex pieces – are being converted now, said Treasurer Ron Williams.
“It’s taken a lot of meetings, but we’re whittling the numbers down,” Commissioner of the Revenue Susan Draper said of tens of thousands of pieces of converted data.
Gard-Smith said a lot of work has been done to improve the connection between the new software and the general ledger, which was the big hiccup last year.
The billing and cashiering systems need to communicate daily summary totals automatically to the city’s financial accounting and reporting system, said Finance Director Tealen Hansen.
Hansen said her department and PCI have done a lot of work on mapping to make sure different transactions are being coded correctly so they end up in the right places in the general ledger. Testing thus far shows it’s working, she said.
George said she didn’t think the project team would know for sure the system is doing what it’s supposed to do until they’re further along in testing. But it looks promising, she said.
“From PCI’s point of view,” said Main, the head of the company, “we’re pleased with how things are going forward.”
©2016 The Virginian-Pilot (Norfolk, Va.). Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
