A SENIOR Worcestershire County Council officer who oversaw the implementation of a new payroll system that left almost 150 staff underpaid has quit the authority for another job.

It has emerged that Dr Peter Bishop left the council after five years on June 1 having landed a new job with Birmingham City Council.

He held a number of senior roles during his time at Worcestershire County Council, including head of IT, but was given the highly paid job of Director of Commercial and Change – which has a pay grade of between £107,000 and £125,000 – on an interim basis last summer.

And it was during this time he led the implementation of the automated Mercury HR and Finance systems alongside the authority’s partner Liberata for around 16,000 employees and school staff.

Last month the Shuttle revealed how the system has been hit with blunders including the underpayment or overpayment of wages and potential data breaches which saw employees given log-ins that allowed them to see the personal information of other staff.

Among the schools hit included Baxter College, Wolverley CE Secondary School and all of those part of the Severn Academies Educational Trust.

The issues were branded a “raft of disasters” by public sector union Unison who said some of the lowest paid staff had received up to £500 less in their monthly pay packet.

A Worcestershire County Council spokesman said: "Peter Bishop, who had been holding the role of Director of Commercial and Change on an interim basis since last summer, has moved on from Worcestershire County Council after five years at the organisation to join Birmingham City Council.

"We are still in the process of rolling out the new Mercury HR and Finance system to around 16,000 County Council staff, maintained schools and academies.

“We are working closely with our partner Liberata to work through any issues to resolve them as soon as we can.

"We have a large support team in place to provide technical support and advice. We will be reviewing the roll out of new systems and making sure that lessons are learnt."

The authority’s chief financial officer Sean Pearce, who has been at Worcestershire for more than six years, has taken over from Dr Bishop in overseeing the completion of the transfer to Mercury’s systems.

He has written to all staff affected informing them of the change and to reassure that both the council and Liberata are working through any remaining issues and have an action plan in place.