Government Department charges a Government Department ..

[x-in-man]

.. for stuff it gets paid to do anyway.

https://www.three.fm/news/isle-of-man-news/19000-bill-for-school-fire-callouts/?fbclid=IwAR1hUlTULPFUTD1zeRsWQpnm9ksZzrDqdy__ykSbqGb--HGw9GbmcvFg6Hk_aem_AdnL-B7Fyn3lAdLSqhPnub9xuTKnOVIsMMocfIXjVmvTFsEZkbKs1GfHG6TpRxoOWMPI1g5XA8hb30kbuZhViWVA

 

'And the Department of Home Affairs had charged £19,053.50 for the callouts.'

I found this crazy. 

A team of blokes sit about playing pool and drinking tea.  They get paid by the Tax Payer, and then their department charges another department for the service they offer - which gets paid by the Tax Payer.

We pay twice for the same job.

This sort of thing deters people from calling the emergency service for anything these days for fear of a large bill. 

Fire, Ambulance or any of the others.

I know they have a shiny new turn-table ladder and 'off road' Ambulance to pay for (probably twice) - but I feel this is just mad.

 

 

Edited April 11 by x-in-man

[Anthony Ingham]

22 minutes ago, x-in-man said:

This sort of thing deters people from calling the emergency service for anything these days for fear of a large bill. 

Any evidence for this?  It sounds like absolute rubbish to me but I am happy to be shown otherwise if it is in fact the case.

[The Phantom]

I'm assuming this is just for false callouts?  If there is actually a fire then there is no charge?

[Happier diner]

Its just accountancy

[Ghost Ship]

1 hour ago, The Phantom said:

I'm assuming this is just for false callouts?  If there is actually a fire then there is no charge?

You can't tell because it's such a crap report.  Or maybe it was a crap FoI question.

The UK NHS mental health trust I worked for used to get billed thousands each year for false callouts

As Happier Diner says in the IoM it will basically just be an accounting/cost shifting exercise but will also be intended to cut down on false callouts.

[Fred the shred]

I wonder how much the guy is paid p.a. who sends out these bills and chases up the payments and banks the money etc a lot more than £20,000 a year.   Surely it is better to have a few false call outs than risk a fire in a school ?   

[Roger Mexico]

It's one of those irritating FoI responses that is an image rather than text:

It's worth pointing out that there will be an extra real cost in some cases if, as well as retained officers, local part-time fire crews have been called out to attend an incident as they will be paid extra each time they are required.

[P.K.]

15 minutes ago, Fred the shred said:

I wonder how much the guy is paid p.a. who sends out these bills and chases up the payments and banks the money etc a lot more than £20,000 a year.   Surely it is better to have a few false call outs than risk a fire in a school ?   

Cross-charging is a nonsense when you think most departments don't actually turn a profit. I certainly wouldn't want them to because it means I'm being taxed twice. IOMSPCo take note.

It's a difficult balance though. Say the education system is squeezed so they cut down on maintenance. Which could mean more false fire alarms. Which are basically a nuisance. Obviously if they're attending a nuisance call when they should be somewhere else then It's serious.

Someone, somewhere, should have the figures to put it in perspective.

ETA - well I never, a cross post...

Edited April 11 by P.K.

[Gladys]

28 minutes ago, Fred the shred said:

I wonder how much the guy is paid p.a. who sends out these bills and chases up the payments and banks the money etc a lot more than £20,000 a year.   Surely it is better to have a few false call outs than risk a fire in a school ?   

Doubt they will raise a bill just make a charge through the internal accounts. 

[mayhem]

There is an entire cottage industry within Gov with departments charging and recharging each other for services, as said it's just cost center / adjustments etc.  GTS for instance often portray themselves as a profit centre by recharging for their services and "experitise" to other departments after forcing them to centralise their budgets and give up their own IT staff (to work for GTS).  Departments hate the model, less service, less control, less service (I know I put this twice), no budget and often asked to pay again. 

[Happier diner]

3 hours ago, P.K. said:

Cross-charging is a nonsense when you think most departments don't actually turn a profit. I certainly wouldn't want them to because it means I'm being taxed twice. IOMSPCo take note.

It's a difficult balance though. Say the education system is squeezed so they cut down on maintenance. Which could mean more false fire alarms. Which are basically a nuisance. Obviously if they're attending a nuisance call when they should be somewhere else then It's serious.

Someone, somewhere, should have the figures to put it in perspective.

ETA - well I never, a cross post...

If they didn't cross charge how would they know how much each department actually costs

[Happier diner]

2 hours ago, mayhem said:

here is an entire cottage industry within Gov with departments charging and recharging each other for services,

No its not. All large organisations do it and for good reason. Its not a cottage industry even in IOM Government, It takes practically no time what so ever. All done electronically

No organisation can be effective if it doesn't get its accountancy right.

We can moan about a lot of things our government and its departments do. This is not one of them.

[Omobono]

some people will agree with this  especially the police who get called out to all sorts  of silly domestics  ,  noisey neighbours  drunks  ,and   999 calls  government debt recovery  and fines  and  faulty   and  intruder alarms they have to respond to , there could be a whole new government department established with  Bailiff's appointed   

[Jarndyce]

4 hours ago, P.K. said:

Cross-charging is a nonsense when you think most departments don't actually turn a profit

 

52 minutes ago, Happier diner said:

If they didn't cross charge how would they know how much each department actually costs

One example: Tynwald give Nobles a kicking every year when they "overspend" on their budget.   But, IIRC, Nobles were not allowed to cross-charge DofE for any increased costs (staffing, drugs and services, etc) accrued as a result of TT and other motorsport events.

[mayhem]

2 hours ago, Happier diner said:

No its not. All large organisations do it and for good reason. Its not a cottage industry even in IOM Government, It takes practically no time what so ever. All done electronically

No organisation can be effective if it doesn't get its accountancy right.

We can moan about a lot of things our government and its departments do. This is not one of them.

My experience is that it does take time, is inefficient (particularly when budgets have been centralised to provide service) and managers spend a lot of time proclaiming they and their staff are profit centre serving their clients (other departments) and basically use the cross charging model to pretend they are running a business (internally).

I’m very much a fan of justifying and quantifying things but the layers of bureaucracy and processes that they go through with the recharging is the issue not the recharging itself which I’m well aware is the norm in all medium + sized organisations (IOM is large by IOM standard but not by many other metrics)

Edited April 11 by mayhem
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