The Oakland County Budget Committee voted Dec. 31 to recommend that the full commission consider a capital expenditure to extend the county's NeoGov software to include HRIS and payroll modules. Amanda Osborne gave the presentation and described recurring errors with the county’s current Central Square payroll and HR processes that have required manual audits and retroactive corrections.
Osborne said the proposed first‑year implementation funding is $136,004.57 and that ongoing maintenance would later be funded from operations; she also said the county currently pays roughly $200,000 a year in maintenance for related services. "This has to work," Osborne said, describing problems with payroll calculations, PERS reporting and the inability to process retro pay automatically for roughly 420 employees. Committee members pressed for assurances the vendor would provide implementation support and fixes.
NeoGov representative Alan Paul told the committee the company lengthened the planned implementation to a full year to allow parallel payroll runs and additional services to reduce risk. "We're actually gonna take the whole year," Paul said, explaining the vendor intends to run both systems in parallel until the county is confident the payroll and reporting functions are correct. Paul also said NeoGov provides code‑free reporting tools and that the contract includes performance language and provisions for support.
Committee members said on‑site training and hands‑on support during the go‑live phase were essential. A member asked about training and whether reports could be produced without technical SQL skills; Paul said the system’s reports are designed to be used without programming. The committee moved and seconded a recommendation to forward the proposal to the full commission; the committee voted in favor.
Next steps: the proposal will be placed on the full commission agenda for consideration and formal approval.