The Hidden Cost of Fragmented Local Government IT Systems
3 February 2026
Fragmented local government IT systems increase costs, not through higher contracts, but through duplication, manual processes and lost capacity that accumulate over time. Understanding how these hidden costs arise is essential to identifying where consolidation can unlock efficiency and resilience.
Many of the costs created by local government IT systems never appear on a balance sheet.
When councils review their digital estate, attention usually focuses on licence fees, support contracts and renewal dates. These are visible, auditable and easy to compare year on year.
But the real drain on resources often hides in plain sight. Some of the most significant costs associated with local government IT systems are far less visible. They show up elsewhere through fragmented and disconnected systems, duplicated effort and manual workarounds that absorb organisational capacity year after year.
How do fragmentated IT systems develop over time?
Fragmented system landscapes rarely result from a single decision. More often, they are the result of many reasonable choices made under pressure.
A new system is introduced to meet an urgent service need. A legacy application is retained because replacing it feels too risky. A specialist tool is procured to support a specific function. Funding arrives with tight timelines and limited scope.
Each decision makes sense in isolation. Over time, these choices create fragmented local government IT systems that work individually yet struggle to work together. And this pattern creates environments that are difficult to change once services are live – a challenge explored in more detail in our blog on why legacy systems in local government struggle to adapt.
The everyday operational cost of fragmentation
Fragmentation doesn’t always cause obvious failure. Instead, it introduces friction into everyday work. This often looks like:
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Information being re-keyed across multiple systems
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Duplicate processes running in parallel
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Manual checks to compensate for gaps between systems
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Workarounds built by teams to keep services moving
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Delays caused by handovers between departments.
Individually, these issues may seem manageable. Collectively, they absorb a significant amount of staff time and effort.
In practice, councils that address fragmentation through consolidation often see measurable reductions in operational cost and effort.
Impact in practice:
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£1m saved in licence fees over five years
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100+ applications replaced through consolidation
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98% reduction in time spent on manual housing verification.
The impact on staff capacity and effort
Over time, fragmented and disconnected IT systems place a persistent burden on council staff.
Officers spend less time resolving issues and more time navigating systems. Knowledge becomes siloed. A small number of people become relied upon to “know how things work”. Training new staff takes longer and routine tasks require more effort than they should.
These pressures are rarely the result of individual systems or teams. Instead, it shows up as workload pressure, capacity issues or process complexity – symptoms that mask the root cause.
How do fragmented IT systems affect decision-making?
Effective decision-making depends on timely, consistent information. Fragmented systems make this harder by spreading data across multiple applications – each with different structures, definitions and update cycles. And in practice, that means:
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Reporting becomes manual and time-consuming
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Data that needs to be reconciled before it can be trusted
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Leaders lack a clear, shared view of performance
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Early warning signs are easy to miss.
Inconsistent services and citizen experience
Fragmentation also affects how services are delivered. When systems don’t align, consistency becomes difficult to maintain across channels and teams.
Citizens may receive different responses depending on how they contact the council or which service team handles their request. Updates can be delayed because information sits in multiple places. And even simple changes take longer to implement when they must be reflected across several systems.
These inconsistencies are rarely intentional, but they shape how residents experience council services and ultimately, how the council is perceived.
Why are these costs difficult to see?
The hidden cost of fragmented systems is difficult to quantify because it’s spread across roles, teams and processes. Time is lost in small increments. Workarounds become routine and delays are absorbed into service expectations.
Because these costs don’t sit neatly against a single system or contract, they are often overlooked. Yet taken together, reduce organisational capacity, slow improvement and make change harder to deliver.
From fragmented systems to sustainable efficiency
Addressing fragmentation across local government IT systems isn’t about wholesale replacement or short-term cost cutting. It’s about understanding where complexity, duplication and manual effort have built up over time – and out consolidation can reduce that burden.
By taking a more joined-up view of their IT landscape, councils can begin to unlock capacity, improve consistency and create a stronger foundation for future change. Consolidation becomes the practical route to sustainable efficiency, enabling services to operate more effectively whilst supporting long-term resilience.
About the author
Mark Gannon
Director of Client Solutions
Mark is Director of Client Solutions at Netcall and is on a mission to put the power of digital transformation into the hands of every public sector organisation. He's a former CIO and transformation specialist who worked for over 20 years in several local authorities, including Sheffield City Council, Nottingham City Council, Rotherham Council and Middlesbrough Council. Mark also spent time as a consultant, supporting organisations to take advantage of digital technology.