Judging by the content and the tone of comments to our report, “BBG orders that contractors be paid on time by Thanksgiving,” IBB/BBG employees don’t buy the management’s explanation that an outdated computer system is to blame for late payments to contract employees.
Those employees who have commented see the explanation as a typical ploy by the managers responsible for the problem to deflect the blame from themselves.
Employees also make fun of the BBG-imposed Thanksgiving deadline for paying contract employees and vendors on time.
BBG Watch has received numerous employee complaints about poor leadership, poor employee morale, lack of training, and general turmoil in the office responsible for processing payments.
Here are some of the comments to our earlier post:

Anonymous says 11 February 12, 5:52pm
“According to our sources, IBB/BBG executives tried to deflect the blame for late payments from themselves by insisting that the problem is only due to the BBG computer system, which they describe as being so old that these managers cannot distinguish the late payments to contractors from late payments to vendors who are suppliers of materials or products.” – this is a business process/training problem and not a system problem.
Many other agencies use this same version of the software and have had for YEARS. Even the updated versions of the software, have the same design for payments and invoices. How come they do not have problems paying their vendors? Management can say, it is because the software is outdated, blah blah. That is gibberish. Management is just defending its obvious incompetence.
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Anonymous5 says 11 February 12, 6:07pm
A manager in the office responsible for paying vendors, is also trying to get Human Resources to replace their system. Why would this manager be spending time doing this? They should be focusing on their own system that they are responsible for and fixing the problems with their system.
A friend is the CFO of the payroll system provider in New Orleans. Human Resources already has a system, that works effectively and they dont want to change it. Look at the employees at BBG, they get paid on time. The HR/payroll system that pays employees is completely different from the system that pays contractors/vendors.
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Anonymous6 says 11 February 12, 6:14pm
And why are there so many chiefs in that office? They need more people to enter payments and do training in that office. They need more people to do the actual work. They have a Deputy CFO and a Deputy Director of Operations.
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Anonymous7 says 11 February 12, 6:16pm
P.S. The surrogate broadcasters use the same financial system to pay their vendors as BBG! I believe they are paid through the Department of State, which uses the SAME, EXACT financial system. Wow!!!!! How about them apples?
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Anonymous says 11 February 12, 8:58pm
By THANKSGIVING? They’re going to make contractors wait only ten more months to be paid?
Wouldn’t ten years be a more realistic goal?
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Anonymous7 says 11 February 12, 11:05pm
Yes, with that management, ten years would be a more realistic goal!
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BBG Watch is republishing the original story here:
BBG orders that contractors be paid on time by Thanksgiving
BBG Watch has learned that at the Governance Committee meeting this week, the Committee adopted unanimously (all four Governors present were: Michael Lynton, Susan McCue, Dennis Mulhaupt and Victor Ashe; Lynton and McCue participated by phone) a motion directing that all contractors be paid on time by Thanksgiving of this year. 
Late payments of payroll have been a major problem for years, which top IBB/BBG managers blamed on the outdated computers system, but which numerous employees who write to BBG Watch blame entirely on poor management, poor employee morale in the office responsible for payments, and poor employee training.
Sources told BBG Watch that the next Governance Committee meeting will hear from unions and contractors in person.  This is a first time that the Board is reaching out to hear from employees, largely thanks to BBG Governor Victor Ashe’s efforts who believes that a lot more still needs to be done, a source close to the Board told BBG Watch.
According to our sources, Susan McCue does support Ashe on employee issues.  Sources also told us that Ashe is especially concerned about contractor employees are treated and paid and wants these issues to be monitored and pushed.
 
According to our sources, IBB/BBG executives tried to deflect the blame for late payments from themselves by insisting that the problem is only due to the BBG computer system, which they describe as being so old that these managers cannot distinguish the late payments to contractors from late payments to vendors who are suppliers of materials or products.
This explanation, according to our sources, made it difficult for the Governance Committee members to understand that poor leadership and mismanagement are the real reasons for the late payments since this problem has been lingering for years. If the computer system is the real problem, one source said, these managers should have addressed it years ago, but it does not appear that it is the main or the real cause behind late payments to contract employees and vendors.
The CFO’s office, according to our sources, is in turmoil. We hear that instead of training and motivating employees, some have been fired and humiliated in front of their coworkers by their managers. We also hear of enormous amounts of money being spent on outside consulting contractors without any real benefits to the agency. One source told us that wrong and apparently fake employee identification numbers were put into the system because managers failed to train the staff. These sources describe the atmosphere in the office as filled with fear and mistrust.
Critics wonder what would happen if the same management team is put in charge of designing the payment processing system for a restructured BBG and the surrogate broadcasters. Under their current independent administrative status, the surrogate broadcasters pay their own salaries and bills on time. That may change if and when they are merged under a plan designed by BBG executives.
The Governance Committee is to meet again on March 7 and the full Board is to meet on March 8.