Another blunder in Amsterdam's payment system as city overpays €21 mil. on invoices
The municipality of Amsterdam has had another blunder with its new payment system, Afis. The city accidentally paid €21 million worth of invoices twice, alderman Hester van Buren of finance wrote in a letter to the council. She blamed human error, AT5 reports.
The error occurred when a municipal official accidentally activated a function that triggered the payment of 667 invoices twice. According to Van Buren, the double payment was noticed the next morning, and the city contacted all 583 suppliers.
Around €8 million has already been refunded, and Van Buren doesn’t expect any problems with getting the rest of the amount back. “These are parties and companies with whom the municipality has an established relationship. This also allows for offsetting against outstanding or future invoices.”
To prevent a similar blunder in the future, the alderman has deactivated the function that caused it.
This is not the first time Van Buren has had to explain issues with Afis. After the new system’s implementation, tens of thousands of invoices went unpaid, leaving many entrepreneurs who do business with the city in trouble.
By the end of February, the total backlog stood at over 43,000 unpaid invoices. It ultimately cost the municipality €2.8 million to fix this issue. It took months to get all the involved entrepreneurs paid.
