E-Government
Achieving considerable benefits by egovernment
ABSTRACT:
Many interesting e-government cases are analysed in the report DOES E-GOVERNMENT
PAY OFF? This study was carried out under the commission of the Dutch Presidency of the
EPAN network. Starting from the presumption, that e-government is an important means for a
better performing public administration, the study has been undertaken to further explore the
benefits on the one hand and the required back office changes on the other hand.
AUTHOR: John Kootstra (john.kootstra@minbzk.nl)
Achieving considerable benefits by egovernment
In most European countries citizens wrestle with their tax return each year. Trying to collect
extracts of pay roll deductions, and all kind of information needed for a filling a tax
declaration. And wait for half a year until they hear whether their declaration is approved and
will get a refund. But life can be so much easier. The Estonian ‘e-maksuamet’ is the evidence.
Citizens are offered an electronic prefilled tax declaration, and if they confirm that their data
are correct, they will have refund in one day. Instead of having civil servants personally
reviewing the tax declarations, at present time electronic risk analysis has made the process
much more efficient.
Low income citizens in the Netherlands are entitled for a housing benefit. In the past, before
actually receiving the benefit, they needed to fill difficult forms, collect data at different
organizations and stay in uncertainty for a long time, whether the benefits was granted.
Instead of having to repeat this time consuming act each year, the grant is now automatically
renewed after the housing department has electronically checked whether the situation has
stayed the same. Considering that about 1 mln applications needed to be processed, one can
imagine the benefits, both for the citizens and the public organizations involved in executing
the service.
These are just two appealing cases, examined in a study, carried out under the commission of
the Dutch Presidency of the EPAN network. Starting from the presumption, that egovernment
is an important means for a better performing public administration, the study has been
undertaken to further explore the benefits on the one hand and the required back office
changes on the other hand.
People working in public administrations should rethink, starting from the citizen’s
perspective, how processes could be more customer friendly, causing less administrative
burden and increasing transparency, and how ICT could be integrated in a smart way.
Rather than overasking citizens, ICT enables sharing data with other public agencies, in order
to improve the service delivery process.
The Estonian tax board can, only after exchanging data with public agencies and legal entities
responsible for social insurance, education, and mortgage, offer a prefilled tax form. A similar
condition applies to the Dutch Housing Department, with exchanges with e.g. the central
register for natural persons, the tax board, renting agencies.
This also has considerable efficiency gains for the organizations, and indirectly this give more
value for tax payers money. Realizing a major saving was the main driver for the new housing
benefit scheme. And many cases showed that instead of putting too much effort in data entry
functions, reviewing etc, staff could be used for customers that deserve more attention.
Of course a process can not be changed, from one day to another. Quality of the service has to
be guaranteed. Changes in the process often create uncertainty and in a way cause resistance.
Can data of other organizations be trusted? Is there enough room for development by the
management? Or do legal arrangements prevent a possible data exchange? But this
uncertainty may not prevent ambitious public officers from thinking from the perspective of
the citizens and rethinking the process.
The study described the different conditions that are relevant and how they were dealt with in
the various cases. We hope that this study can provide you inspiration.