NSW Police IPOS overhaul half-a-billion over budget

NSW Police will need close to an extra half-a-billion dollars and four more years to deliver a long overdue upgrade to its core systems, a stinging audit report has found.

In 2020, NSW Police forecast that it would deliver the overhaul to its Integrated Policing Operating System (IPOS) by mid-next year and within an estimated budget of $328 million.

However, the NSW Auditor General has found that the IPOS upgrade is in need of an extra $493 million to meet its aims, which now aren’t expected to be delivered until 2031, four years later than planned.

The scope of the IPOS overhaul is wide.

It covers the force’s Computerised Operational Policing System (COPS), its computer aided dispatch (CAD), its forensics and exhibits management system (EFIMS), its custody management, and its major investigations and intelligence gathering capability, E@gle-i.

According the NSW Auditor General, NSW Police developed the final business case for the IPOS transformation in 2020 but, after blowing through $155 million between March of 2021 and December of 2025, the program has only delivered one out of five expected the system overhauls in scope.

NSW Police developed a revised business case late last year that found that the IPOS overhaul would need an extra $78 million in capital funding – over and above the $328 million allocation.

However, the 2025 business case also identified the need for a whopping estimated additional $415 million in recurrent funding to deliver the remainder of the IPOS program from this year to 2031.

“Critical components of the core technology program remain outstanding," the audit states.

"In the 2020 final business case, the NSW Police Force had planned to upgrade core policing systems by June 2027.

"The 2024 program reset revised the program end date to 2031, four years later than originally planned.

"Phase one of the program is now scheduled for completion in 2029, with phase two, including COPS modules for intelligence management and custody management, due in 2031.

“In the meantime, the NSW Police Force has maintained end-of-life legacy systems for significantly longer than expected, increasing both capital and recurrent expenditure on systems that do not contribute to future capability.

"Continued reliance on legacy systems also exposes the NSW Police Force to technology risk and reduces operational effectiveness,” the NSW Auditor General wrote in its report.

Part of the overhaul, the decommissioning of the NSW Police mainframe, was expected to return savings of $25 million per year from FY28 and forward to FY39.

The NSW Auditor's Office found an extensive list of governance failures, saying “internal audits, gateway reviews and external reviews during this period consistently highlighted weaknesses in program management, decision making and financial control.”

The most prominent among those related to its selection of a supplier for the COPS overhaul, now up to the third attempt.

The force previously chose a US startup that was deemed “high risk” despite warnings from its own procurement and legal advisors on the company’s capabilities and prospects for fulfilling the contract.

Two other viable suppliers, that returned lower on “operational criteria scores” during the competitive tender process, were put aside.

“Gateway reviews and external advisers had warned NSW Police Force decision makers about delivery optimism and the program's resourcing constraints.

“They also warned about capability risks for the highest ranked supplier. In addition, the NSW Police Force’s legal and procurement advisers raised concerns about the preferred company’s financial position, limited experience delivering systems of comparable scale, and the absence of key capabilities, such as forensics and exhibits,” the auditor wrote in its report.

“To reduce the likelihood of repeating this experience, the NSW Police Force has since changed its procurement approach, moving away from a single vendor delivery model and applying stricter requirements for supplier capability and experience,” the auditor added.

The revised business case in 2025, which was devised after the NSW Police Force called for a review of the IPOS program in 2024, also found problems with the original 2020 business case for the overhaul.

“The revised business case attributes the additional funding need to rising costs of ICT salaries, less favourable contract terms than it was able to secure in 2020, the move to a multi-vendor strategy and incorrect assumptions made in the 2020 business case,” the auditor wrote.

Part of the delay, the auditor said, was due to a lack of ability to find and retain staff with specialist knowledge to maintain its core system, COPS.