About Transport for London
TfL is a local government body responsible for the transport system in Greater London and delivering the Mayor's strategy on transport in the capital. It has responsibility for running London's network of principal road routes and various rail and bus networks (Underground, London Overground, Docklands Light Railway and TfL Rail).
In 2018/19 TfL managed over 3.7 billion passenger journeys across Buses, London Underground and DLR services alone and to 98% schedule operated
Generates and receives more than £10bn of income and funding per year
27,000 employees
The Requirements
Despite decreasing passenger volumes, economic uncertainties, and reduced government funding, TfL is under continued pressure to deliver a high-quality service to travellers across the network. To this end, it initiated a Finance Improvement Programme (FIP) in 2018 to review and improve finance processes and systems.
Key Findings
- Planning processes were disconnected across three separate systems (IP, BPS, Planning) with different parts of the business following different policies and timetables
- Consolidated Group reporting produced from two additional separate systems (BCS, Cognos)
- Multiple versions of the truth within each system
- A high volume of manual offline spreadsheets, manual administration and replication of data
Within the FIP, TfL sought to address the existing challenges in financial planning and reporting by focusing efforts in three key areas:
Clearly defining the end to end policies, processes and controls required to improve financial planning and consolidated reporting.
Facilitating the changes through the implementation of a single fit-for-purpose technology solution.
Making the required changes to the culture of financial planning and reporting within TfL.
Addressing these three areas will enable TfL to establish clear policies and controls to ensure financial planning and reporting in the organisation is simple and accurate, instilling confidence in the outputs.
