While sentencing a man in the Oamaru District Court, Judge Joanna Maze criticised the coding the service used.
The coding sometimes produced "silly things" and did not match the Ministry of Justice files she used.
She said it was a problem up and down the country and told the lawyers present they should be aware of it.
"Something needs to be done about it because your records aren’t right. I know you say Ministry of Justice, but it looks different. It’s a completely different setup and at times completely different wording."
Chief probation officer Darius Fagan said the Department of Corrections worked closely with the Ministry and police.
"There is no separate coding, just slight variations in the formatting of our reports. All the information comes from the same source."
He said in Wednesday’s sentencing of Josh Peter Hall, of Waimate, there was an administrative error that, after working with the Ministry, was fixed.
He apologised for any inconvenience caused.
