Air Force deployment of a key enterprise resource planning system has lagged behind schedule, a service official acknowledged Oct. 27 before a House Armed Services Committee panel hearing.

The service's Expeditionary Combat Support System is undergoing "strategic reassessment" by a joint Defense Department office of the secretary and Air Force team, said David Tillotson, Air Force deputy chief management officer, in his prepared testimony (.pdf).

The OSD-Air Force team is considering ECSS alternatives such as "building on the current ERP software, leveraging other service/Defense agency solutions, and/or modifying legacy capability," Tillotson added.

Military Services and the Pentagon are under a congressional mandate to achieve audit readiness by fiscal 2017, a goal that Air Force officials have said they are at moderate risk of missing.

ECSS, a supply chain management ERP meant to replace 240 legacy logistics and financial systems, was originally meant to achieve full deployment of its first increment across the service in October 2013. The Air Force first obligated money for the program in August 2005--meaning that the program has missed the 5-year deadline for DoD MAIS efforts to go through a full deployment decision.

According to the ECSS major automated information systems annual report (.pdf) transmitted to Congress earlier this year, ECSS is operational at Hanscom Air Force Base.  

Another Air Force ERP, the Defense Enterprise Accounting and Management System, will require an additional $678 million on top of the $313.2 million already invested into it to bring it into full operational status by the fourth quarter of fiscal 2016, Tillotson also said in his testimony.

ECSS is not the only service ERP to undergo major changes.

The Navy's Future Pay and Personnel Solution--the service's successor to the canceled Defense Integrated Military Human Resources System--was reset from the engineering and manufacturing development phase (Milestone B) to the material solution analysis phase (pre-Milestone A) in October 2010, Navy Deputy Chief Management officer Eric Fanning said in his prepared testimony (.pdf).

"The overarching goal is to first understand any issues affecting financial controls and the business processes leading toward auditability. Once those issues are clear, the next steps will be to determine the appropriate remedy to enable solution," he wrote.

During the hearing, Asif Khan, Government Accountability Office director of financial management and assurance, said a main challenge across all DoD ERP programs has been up front requirements definition.

For more:
- go to the hearing webpage (prepared testimonies available)
- go to a DOD webpage with the most recent MAIS reports, or directly download the ECSS report (.pdf)

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