Systems failure

The association has 14,000 properties and receives more than two-thirds of its cashflow from housing benefit. The money, along with a schedule detailing which tenant each payment is for, is sent from 35 different authorities; 90% of this information arrives on paper, as computer printouts, letters or faxes. Even the 10% that gets there by email or modem link must be printed out and re-entered into the association's own housing management system.

It would be better, the manager says, if the councils the association deals with were to send payments and schedules electronically in a standard format that could be fed directly into the in-house systems, updating them immediately. This could free up at least one, possibly two members of staff for other work.

But agreeing on a common standard is little more than a daydream. "It's on the 'too difficult to do' pile and no one's picking it up," says the frustrated IT manager.

This manager's story is by no means unique. The payment of housing benefit remains a complex and paper-heavy system: figures from management consultant RSM Robson Rhodes show that in 2002, seven out of 10 registered social landlords were still engaged in a laborious paperchase, despite the fact that the same survey showed housing benefit administration had been their most pressing IT issue since 1998.

Electronic delivery would not only mean speedier and more efficient processes; compatible systems across councils would give them a better chance of spotting fraudsters claiming benefits in more than one area. So why isn't more being done?

For a start, upgrading and standardising a system is costly and complex – the necessary technical changes and accompanying staff training at each council could run into hundreds of thousands of pounds. Although it is difficult to pin down the exact amount such a project would cost, because the systems authorities use to process payments may come from any one of a dozen companies and have often been extensively adapted to their own needs, or even designed specifically for that council.

Target practice
The government's own e-government target exacerbates the problem. Set in 2000, it states that all services to the public must be made available electronically by 2005.

In order to meet this, some councils have been focusing investment on what the taxpayers see, at the expense of behind-the-scenes transactions.

RSLs can receive and send information electronically, but often our hands are tied as councils cannot

Rebecca Silk, IT Manager, Circle 33

Kable, a company that analyses the progress of e-government, estimates that around three-quarters of local authorities have taken some steps to meeting the 2005 target, but that most local government activity is focusing on websites and contact centres. "Local authorities are grappling with an enormous agenda and they need to work out where to concentrate their efforts," says Karen Swinden, Kable's head of forecasting. "Some will go for the quick and easy wins, and make links with citizens because then they're meeting targets, and forget about the back-office. But there's no point of, say, logging a repair on a website if someone then prints it out and puts it in a pile."

As Rebecca Silk, IT manager at RSL Circle 33, explains: "RSLs can receive information and send information to local authorities in electronic format, but often our hands are tied as councils have not made the same progress in this area," she says. The association receives £1.47m of housing benefit from 30 local authorities every month, but only 15 of the 120 schedules arrive electronically.

Housing benefit reforms announced in October 2002 are also hindering reform in benefits processing. After trials in pathfinder areas, the Department of Work and Pensions may decide to make payments to claimants directly, eliminating much of the information that must travel between councils and housing associations. In the meantime, local authorities are reluctant to throw resources at a problem that may go away on its own.

Pressure points
What is required, says Silk, is a lobbying group of housing associations to take up the issue with councils: "RSLs need a forum or body that can take the lead so we get a standard format across the sector."

John Stuttard, the IT consultant at RSM Robson Rhodes who wrote its 2002 report, agrees. RSLs, he says, should lobby the National Housing Federation, which must then put pressure on the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister to rethink the modernising agenda for local government. In December 2001, with the encouragement of the Housing Corporation, he wrote a letter on the subject to Malcolm Wicks at the Department for Work and Pensions. Wicks agreed that housing benefit delivery was an issue, but said that it was up to the ODPM to tackle it. Stuttard then wrote to ODPM minister Nick Raynsford, but he says the department only parroted the e-government plans in response. "They're doing their best to lob it around to each other, hoping it will stick," he says.

An ODPM consultation paper last June made references to the need for data sharing between local authorities and other bodies using common standards, but gave no details of how or when. Stuttard again made enquiries but received no response.

But he has not given up. He has contacted Malcolm Wicks at the DWP again, this time by a letter sent via a senior chief executive within the sector, and intends to send a copy of the RSM Robson Rhodes survey to Lord Rooker. "All I want is for someone to come back and tell us what's going on. We can't continue with this black hole we've got at the moment," he says, adding: "It should be the National Housing Federation doing this."

The NHF says it is attempting to draw ministers' attention to its members' concerns, but technology is only one of a number of administrative headaches it is targeting regarding housing benefit. In its 2002 annual report, it claims it has brought about "a range of technical and operational improvements" to the system. "We have a set of proposals to make housing benefit work better," says NHF policy officer Fola Ogunjobi. "We have suggested that local authorities and housing associations should agree on how to exchange this data."

On Tuesday mornings, when we make the housing benefit payments, we spend a couple of hours laboriously sending papers by fax 

Tim Brierley, benefits service manager, bracknell forest council

However, no amount of lobbying will make a difference to councils' approach to IT unless it is backed by pressure from the ODPM. "There's no will on the behalf of local authorities to enter into dialogue on the subject, or to change their methods. Various people have tried but it's too many small voices," says one IT manager at a large RSL. "I'd like government to force all local authority housing benefit offices to provide electronic payments in a standard format."

According to the ODPM, electronic links with other agencies are a key part of the modernising programme for local government, but the message does not seem to have filtered down to councils.

However, there are some glimmers of hope. For example, IT managers at RSLs believe that electronic communications will become more frequent as councils routinely replace their systems with newer versions, though there is no guarantee that common standards will proliferate.

There is also some good practice to be found in the sector where a housing association deals with just one or two councils. Some have agreed a way of communicating that minimises workload on both sides.

In the case of stock transfers, it is usually relatively straightforward to transmit information electronically across newly devolved networks, and some councils then use this as a pilot to look into expanding electronic links to other associations. Many foresee a snowball effect as local schemes expand and join up, or councils band together to persuade technology vendors to adapt their products to common standards.

Bromley council in south-east London, for example, has recognised the benefits of streamlining the ways it communicates with housing associations. Bromley led the ExSEL project, the development of a web-based method of exchanging data between councils and other agencies, which went live on 1 April last year. Authorities in nearby Bexley and Greenwich have joined the project, and IT company ECsoft – which provided the technology for the scheme – is keen to point out that there is no reason why other councils could not sign up to use the system.

Bracknell Forest council expects to present housing benefit information to its social landlords via a web-based browser within 18 months. Landlords will be able to access the system at their leisure. "It makes sense," explains Tim Brierley, benefits service manager. "At the moment, on Tuesday mornings, when we make the payments, we spend a couple of hours laboriously sending papers by fax."

This is all to be welcomed, but few of those involved in using or analysing IT in the housing sector credit the notion of local authorities suddenly rushing en masse to solve a problem that has rumbled on for the past five years.