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(VietNamNet Bridge)-While the “Electronic one-stop shop” had been mentioned in many state’s documents, it had remained unfamiliar to the public until recently.

Electronic one-stop shop - the tool to assess public administration reform

In early 2012, the Ministry of Information and Communication released the set of standards to assess the electronic one-stop shop system, considered as a tool to measure the success and quality of the system.

Electronic one-stop shop is the mechanism under which information technology is applied to computerize the transactions between institutions, individuals and state agencies, and the transactions among state agencies, thus helping reduce people’s time when following administrative formalities.

Tan Binh district in HCM City was the pioneer in utilizing the electronic one-stop shop mechanism when it kicked off the system in 2005. The volume of works handled manually has been reduced by 20-30 percent. The system allows officers easily check documents, receive complaints from people, while leaders and local people can supervise the process of dealing with cases.

The electronic one-stop shop has been applied in Bac Giang city since 2009. It was the officers of the local department of information and communication who wrote the software pieces for the electronic one-stop shop system, which helped the city save billions of dong.

It was estimated that the city would have to pay 300-500 million dong for every district to set up the electronic one-stop shop system, if it had hired information technology firms. Meanwhile, in fact, it had to spend one billion dong only. The software piece has been applied in two districts and three local departments of the city.

State agencies ready, but people not yet

While the electronic one-stop shop system has got ready in Bac Giang City to receive documents from people, no document has been sent online.

An official of the Bac Giang department of information and communication said that as there has been no electronic authentication, the documents sent via Internet are just for reference, while people still come to submit printed versions to have their problems settled.

“We have the electronic one-stop shop mechanism, but we still lack electronic citizens,” he said.

The case of Bac Giang explains why other localities still keep hesitant to develop e-government. While it is very costly to develop the electronic one stop shop mechanism, there still has no harmonious cooperation among administrative agencies and between local authorities and people.

Under the set of standards released by the Ministry of Information and Communication, the quality of a system would be assessed based on three factors, including the level of providing public services, the quality of services and the efficiency of the services.

The assessment procedure would base on international standards ISO-9126 and ISO-145. Experts have pointed out that the set of standards would serve as a tool for local authorities assess their quality themselves and consider the efficiency of utilizing the electronic one stop shop mechanism. Meanwhile, local authorities can also refer to the standards to assess their investment projects in one stop shop mechanisms.

Under the government’s resolution No. 30c on the master plan on state’s administrative reform in 2011-2020, most of transactions of state agencies would be carried out on the electronic environment by 2020.