Version Experience 7.5 to 9.1 

The PeopleSoft Pension Administration (PSPA) module has, over the years, been changed infrequently and the core functions have not changed except to be made more accurate or to be appropriate to the market as it has slowly developed. 

The story of the PSPA module is one that differs from other modules. First, substantially fewer instances of the PSPA module have been sold by PeopleSoft and then Oracle as compared to the HRMS, Payroll, or even the Benefit Administration modules. Therefore, much less money has been invested by PeopleSoft in the perfection of the PSPA module. 

In fact, PeopleSoft did not retain the knowledge of actuarial and other defined benefit pension wisdom for the purpose of creating the pension application on their own. Consequently, PeopleSoft partnered with Mercer Human Resource Consulting in order to gain their expertise with pension software. 

Needless to say, this relationship was rocky and fraught with disagreement. This element of the source of the pension module creation lead to slow if not non-existent changes to the PSPA module over the course of version upgrades. 

Also, the pension user-group was repeatedly told their recommended application changes would be looked at, but in all reality the financial costs of making certain changes standard and a delivered functionality in the next version made it a very low priority to PeopleSoft and often the promise was left unfulfilled. 

Much of the issues regarding version changes were financial in nature, but there is a more fundamental issue that has plagued the PSPA module from its creation. The software developer 80/20 rule runs very much amuck when it comes to all pension software.

“Vilfredo Pareto, an Italian economist, developed the 80/20 rule in the early 1900s to describe a law of income distribution: 20 percent of a nation's population holds 80 percent of the wealth. And the 80/20 rule still applies today to a surprising number of circumstances, including software development. In the software realm, the first 20 percent of the work produces 80 percent of the project, but the remaining 20 percent of the work takes 80 percent of the overall project's time.”

In short, the number of pension plan variations caused by, legislation, lawyers, unions, companies trying to pay less, and the work of actuaries being creative for account retention purposes have made it nearly impossible to design a software application to cover 80% of the possible DB and DC plan variations. Therefore, PeopleSoft Pension Administration software was created with 19 core functions (Function Results) and the implementation expert needs to make this delivered application work by hook or crook.

Expertise in making needed software adaptation without creating a customization comes from years of experience and the intricate knowledge of how the delivered functionality actually works. Paul Gathard has such experience and knowledge.