Georgina Stafford knew something was wrong. As the business manager of Ilfracombe Junior, a Church of England school on the north coast of Devon, she was well-versed in managing yearly budgets.
But last April, the sums spouting from her school’s budgeting software weren’t adding up.
“I thought it was my fault,” she said. “I redid my whole budget about four times before I finally got it to give me correct figures. And I only knew they were correct because I calculated them myself in Excel.”
The budgeting program, owned by computer software company The Access Group, had suggested Ilfracombe Junior’s budget was £45,000 more than Stafford’s final, accurate figures. It was only her diligence that saved the school from falling into shortfall.
Devon County Council has now admitted at least 33 schools have been affected by issues with the software.
Some, according to whistleblowers, have made financial and staffing decisions based on the error-riddled forecasts, and now face making redundancies.
Many are angry that the council initially sought to blame them for the software’s errors, and did not pick up on the problem earlier.
‘Jobs are on the line’
“People need to understand that jobs are on the line and vital support for children and young people will be removed immediately,” said one primary head, who spoke to Schools Week under the condition their name not be used.
Richard Foord, MP for Honiton and Sidmouth, said he was “frustrated” that pupils in at least one school in his patch will lose out because of the “misallocation of budgets by Devon County Council”.
Foord said he knew of a second school, outside his constituency, which has a £120,000 shortfall as a result of the software issue.
Schools Week could not independently verify information on the second school.
The Access budgeting software is provided by Devon to more than 100 local authority-maintained schools.
On its website, The Access Group said 9,000 “learning institutions” uses its education software, including 50 per cent of all academies.
The glitch is thought to have arisen as a result of a software update following the teacher pensions’ uplift, according to Devon council meeting minutes.
‘The hurt that was caused…there is longevity in that’
It was brought to the council’s attention at the end of the summer term last year.
In November, the council said that schools had received “exactly the funding that they should have”, but that “they have just allocated that funding wrongly through their budget setting system”.
However, the minutes were later amended to reflect that the school’s spending decisions had been made as a result of the software’s calculations.
Last week, Christopher Tribble, head of Honiton Primary in east Devon, told the council’s education forum that professional trust had been lost.
“The hurt that was caused…there is longevity in that,” he said.
‘Horrific’ experience
At a recent public meeting, Jack Newton, Devon’s deputy director of education, said the council was seeking legal advice. A council spokesperson told Schools Week they were taking the matter “extremely seriously” and had apologised to schools.
“[We] have been working closely with the provider of the Access software to gain a full understanding of what happened to ensure that it cannot happen again.
“It’s clear that our initial communication to schools inadvertently caused schools to believe that the council blamed them for the error. That wasn’t the intention, and we immediately issued a further communication to schools to clarify the position at the time.”
Simon Baines, managing director of The Access Group’s non-profit and education division, said the problem had arisen “due to a lack of access to the level of support, training, and guidance we routinely provide to our direct customers”.
The council had been operating under a “legacy contract” with “limited direct engagement with our customer success team”.
The company has been working with the council and affected schools to “provide immediate assistance and ensure similar errors do not occur in the future”.
But for schools, the question of how to handle their debts remains unanswered.
“It was horrific,” Stafford said of her experience. “£45,000. That’s a teacher. That’s two or three TAs. It’s a big impact.”
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