Milwaukee County uncovers pension miscalculation



MILWAUKEE -- The computer software that processes pension payments to retirees of Milwaukee County has underpaid 601 employees. The employees affected retired between 2009 and February 2012. In total, the shortage is $304,000 -- or an average of $505 per person.

"Anytime we're catching an error late--it's something that concerns me. Our sense is this stems from an improperly-written computer specification," Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele said.

Officials with the Milwaukee County Employees' Retirement System are investigating exactly how this happened. But according to a release by Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele, it appears "there was an error in the programming of the software that was signed off on in 2007. The software went live in 2009."

Letters to the 601 retirees will be sent out shortly letting them know about the situation and checks will follow in a few weeks. The money will be paid from the pension fund which is currently funded at over $1.8 billion.

The code will be fixed and backdrop payments adjusted for all future checks.

FOX6 News asked Abele if he was concerned about the fact that neither the internal nor the external pension program audits caught the miscalculation.

"The purpose of audits is to catch things like this, so if an internal and external audit didn't catch it, yeah, it's something to be concerned about, and we'll be taking that up with the auditors," Abele said.