There's a good chance prisoners will soon have to be held in police and court cells or in prison recreation areas, with the number behind bars expected to keep rising, 1 NEWS has been told.
The union for prison guards also says some staff have already been paid emergency payments as their workload goes up to cope with demand.
September is tipped to be the crunch month for our heaving prison system, with the number of prisoners expected to peak.
"Where the muster's sitting at the moment it's probably a 50/50 call if we get through it, or we don't get through it, but we need to be making plans to get there," Corrections Association National President Alan Whitley says.
However, there are plans in place if the numbers swell.
"If we exceed the bed capacity there is provision to put them in some temporary bunks but then we have to be looking to court cells and mattresses in the prison to try and get through this," Mr Whitley says.
In 2015 the Ministry of Justice forecast a maximum prison population of 9729 by this year.
The actual number is much more than that, sitting at 10,326, leaving the prison system having to cope with almost 600 more inmates than predicted three years ago.
Corrections Minister Kelvin Davis is confident the situation is under control.
"We've got capacity of about 800 at the moment so I think there's zero chance that we'll be worrying about the use of police or court cells or anything like that, or the use of supplementary accommodation," Mr Davis said.
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