New Court system late, over budget, but going

By RICHARD WOOD

After months of delays and cost blowouts, the Department for Courts has started using its Case Management System, developed in conjunction with IT services firm Datacom.

The system - originally costed at $27 million but now budgeted at $36 million - began working in a Christchurch civil court last Tuesday.

Other civil courts will follow and criminal and family courts are due to go live between March and June.

The original start date was last June.

The new system records all details relevant to a case and ensures case managers are alerted when actions such as document registration occur.

Courts general manager Murray Short said some savings would be made on staff costs but the system was never strong from a return-of-investment viewpoint.

It is expected to save $2.1 million a year eventually.

Meanwhile, a report from Parliament's law and order select committee has highlighted problems in the new fines collection system that went into use last December.

The problems included data integrity issues with converted data, significant reports not being available, and software bugs.

The department says it has overcome all significant flaws.

The report says collection of fines has slowed since the system started.

The amount of unpaid fines has risen from $350 million on June 30 last year to $402 million.

The department is promising that long-term, the new system will bring a 10 per cent improvement in fine collection, reduce paperwork and create a database of civil fine enforcements and payments.

The department is increasing collections staff from 53 to 180, and has been opening new call centres.

It is also looking at matching more data with Inland Revenue.