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With 2 weeks to go until the mandatory introduction of CCMS for all cases, we take a look at the current difficulties with the system.
To provide some context to this blog, we have been using CCMS for billing since 2013 as part of the pilot. Since then the system has undoubtedly improved; however a quick check of the hashtag #CCMSfail on twitter (or indeed the need for such a hashtag) highlights the problems that users have been experiencing recently and the fears about how the system will cope with the planned increase in usage.
Throughout the pilot we experienced problems with the system nearly every time the number of users was significantly increased. The difficulties involved being unable to log in to the system, slow loading times of pages and the system crashing or logging you out unexpectedly. We were assured by the LAA that the problems were not related to capacity and that they could overload their testing system with more users than were ever going to be on the system at any given time and that it could deal with it. Whatever the cause of the difficulties it did appear to be happening at times of increased usage, so much so that during one of the worst periods during the pilot we found that we were able to log in and use the system with very little difficulty…as long as it was outside of normal office hours. Subsequent enhancements to the system thankfully prevented the John M Hayes nightshift from becoming a reality!
Now we are lucky insofar as our use of the system is restricted to billing. If the system is inaccessible for us it can of course cause a delay in submission of a bill; however more significant disruption can be caused at the other end of the process - trying to deal with an application for legal aid.
I do believe that genuine progress was made in the lead up to 1st February. The feedback generally appeared to be that the application process for Special Children Act Applications was working well, the system appeared to be experiencing fewer problems and the decision to delay the mandatory use for all cases was a welcome and sensible step. Unfortunately in the last couple of weeks many of those old problems have resurfaced and at present many users are finding that they are frequently unable to access the system and/or it is operating very slowly. This has of course been acknowledged by the following message on the CCMS training site:
The current issues have been present for a couple of weeks now and there is no indication of when they will be resolved. This naturally raises the question of whether the mandatory introduction can proceed as planned, however the Ministry of Justice are reported to be keen to press on at present. In the meantime there is some good advice on the Legal Aid Handbook website regarding the potential for claiming for time lost due to CCMS.
From a billing perspective, CCMS is much improved over the last 18 months as a result of the claim upload process which allows a specially designed file containing the bill information to be uploaded into the system. This provides many advantages over entering billing information into CCMS, mainly because preparation of the bill itself takes place outside of the system. More information on this can be found here.
Finally, check out our CCMS costs top tips.
Friday 18th March 2016