The government has updated its services for suppliers wishing to access national and county services in case of failure of the Integrated Financial Management Information System (IFMIS), an e-procurement system.
The services are for all prospective and existing suppliers who have for a number of times complained over delayed payments and service delivery.
Some services have been disintegrated from IFMIS to enable all the existing and prospective government suppliers to access them at all Huduma Centres across the country.
"We have listened to our customers, now all prospective and existing government suppliers can access IFMIS Services/Information in all Huduma Centers," stated the National Treasury.
Services to be accessed at Huduma Centres include IFMIS supplier and number registration, KRA pin update and registration, business type/category update, amendment of suppliers contact information, and password reset.
Other services are published government tender opportunities, response to government tender and quotations, submission of Advance Shipment Notices, submission of invoices online, status of invoices, payments and purchase orders.
This is after the National Treasury Cabinet Secretary, Ukur Yatani, in February this year announced new tools in the system to enable government suppliers to lodge and monitor claims for tender payments remotely.
The tools were purposefully implemented to minimise human interaction with government officials who have previously been accused of demanding bribes to facilitate payments.
Almost all the suppliers, both at the county and national government, had blamed the e-procurement system for mishaps, saying they do not have expertise to navigate through it.
IFMIS is a computer system that processes procurement and payments for goods and services bought by national and county government agencies. Its primary objective is to streamline payment of taxes by suppliers to the national and county government entities.
Accessing services at Huduma Centres will facilitate timely payment to suppliers, generation of withholding tax certificates on amounts withheld by withholding agents, and faster processing of tax compliance certificates.
For a number of times, it has been faulted by all governors over its perennial failures, impeding crucial services.
“It was envisaged that through IFMIS, County Governments will have enhanced efficiency in planning, budgeting, procurement, expenditure management and reporting ensuring prudent disbursement and utilization of resource. But the persisting difficulties faced in the use of IFMIS have proved time and again that the system is unreliable and in this regard, the National Treasury must with utmost urgency address emerging challenges to cushion County Governments from public onslaught,” outgoing Makueni governor, Kivutha Kibwana, stated in November last year.
IFMIS was first introduced in 2003 with limited modules for automation when most processes remained manual for several years. It was galvanised in 2012 by President Uhuru Kenyatta who then served as Finance Minister.
He has re-engineered it to serve all county governments to seal corruption loopholes between government workers and suppliers.
