McKesson opens service centre in Wales for NHS payroll and HR system

McKesson Corp is opening a shared service centre in Bangor, Wales to support the integrated payroll and human resources system for the NHS. The investment, which will create 300 jobs over the next three years, has been supported with grant aid from the Welsh Assembly Government.

A consortium led by McKesson, which includes Oracle Corp and IBM, is supplying the NHS with the system, called the Electronic Staff Record (ESR), under a contract worth £240 million.

The ESR was designed to transform the way the NHS delivers both human resources (HR) and payroll services to its employees. The system will create cost efficiencies and service improvement and enable the NHS to have a clear view of its workforce, identify any skills shortages or gaps and provide payroll information, appraisal and training provision.

The pay structures, HR processes, government directives and ever-changing agendas made it one of the most complex, single IT implementations on record. The core system is now fully rolled out and serves 7% of the working population in England and Wales.

More than 1.2 million workers in England and Wales are now paid through the system, which has replaced 28 existing core payroll systems, 67 HR systems and 1702 in-house trust-specific systems.

The Bangor location will be the company’s largest centre in the UK outside its Warwick headquarters. The office on Parc Menai will now become a key centre of operations for McKesson Shared Services. It will manage the day-to-day running of the ESR system on behalf of NHS trusts who opt to outsource their HR and payroll transactional activity. An additional centre is also established in Glasgow.

Their Bangor office, which is owned by the Assembly Government, has the capacity to accommodate up to 120 employees. The company says discussions will take place regarding the procurement of additional offices to accommodate the planned expansion.

Geraint Jones, chief executive of International Business Wales, the economic development arm of the Welsh Assembly Government (WAG), said, “The new Bangor facility will create excellent job opportunities and has been actively supported by WAG.”

Charmaine McDonald, Managing Director of McKesson UK, said: “I am excited at the prospect of developing our shared services facility in Wales. Like the NHS, McKesson’s greatest asset is its people and the thought that we can add more talented people to our team in Bangor is incredibly encouraging. I consider this business unit a core element of our future success in the UK.”

http://www.bjhcim.co.uk/news/2008/n807005.htm

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McKesson opens service centre in Wales for NHS payroll and HR system