'Substantial' cost increase for Landonline system replacement

Land Information New Zealand

LAND GRAB: Property records have come a long way, albeit at a high price, since the first house in Invercargill was sketched by a surveyor in 1856.

Another costly government computer project, this time worth tens of millions of dollars, is in the wings.

Land Information New Zealand said the replacement of its Landonline computer system would cost substantially more than the $42 million estimate it provided to ministers in 2013.

Deputy chief executive Russell Turner would not say whether the bill for the new system, the Advanced Survey and Title Services system (ASaTS), might be more than the original cost of Landonline, which was completed in 2003 at a cost of $141m after a $46m blow-out.

Land Information said it was now time to start planning for a replacement of Landonline. A Cabinet paper in 2013 quoted the likely cost at $42m. At the time, it was envisaged ASaTS would reuse some parts of Landonline.

But Turner said that original estimate had been "very indicative". A tender had since revealed that because few other countries had developed similar systems, there were few "off the shelf" components available and "a high level of customisation" would be needed in any change, he said.

"As a result ... the true cost of the project and is likely to be substantially higher than the earlier indicative figures," he said.

Turner said ASaTS was expected to take a similar length of time as Landonline, about five years, to complete. "As we are still at a relatively early stage in the development of the [project] and preparing a detailed business case for Cabinet, we are not able to discuss the likely budget at this stage," he said.

A parliamentary select committee reported the business case was likely to be ready in "a couple of months".

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'Substantial' cost increase for Landonline system replacement