Automatic payment of child benefit

Acronym of the case:

AVIA

Web address of the case:

http://www.vlaanderen.be/egovernment

Country of the case:

Belgium

City/region:

Flanders region

Posting Date:

12 February 2008

Last Edited Date:

12 February 2008

Author:

Lieven Raes (Ministry of the Flanders Region)

e-government | education | exchange

Type of initiative

Project or service

Case Abstract

Did your child turn 18 and did he or she continue his or her studies? In that case you had to submit a child benefit form to your employer each year. As of 1 September 2007, over 90% of the Flemish parents have been released of this burden. The government has made sure that from now on students older than 18 are registered with the child benefit funds fully automatically. Apart from the far-reaching simplification within the Flemish and federal authorities, 225,000 paper dossiers are also replaced by electronic ones, without any intervention being required from the citizens. This project is an example of E-government in top gear: the government completes the entire process fully automatically, and as such relieves citizens from all the work.

Description of the case

Domain

eGovernment

Topic

Regional and Local | Services for Citizens

Sector

Social Security | Local/Regional Community Development | Social Services

Date

March 2005 to September 2007

Date operational

September 2007

Target Users

Citizen

Target Users Description

All parents with children aged over 18 who are studying.
Independent students older than 18.

Scope

National | Regional (sub-national)

Status

Operation

Language(s)

Dutch

Policy Context and Legal Framework

Project Size and Implementation

Type of initiative

Inclusive services of general interest

Overall Implementation approach

Public administration

Technology choice

Standards-based technology | Mainly (or only) open standards

Funding source

Public funding national | Public funding regional

Project size

Implementation: Not applicable/not available

Implementation and Management Approach

AVIA started at the beginning of 2005. In September 2007 over 200,000 dossiers were exchanged electronically. The realisation of this complex project which had to be built from the bottom up took a short time.

The background: In October schools send digital lists of all enrolled pupils and students to the Department of Education. The Department therefore knows perfectly who is still studying. Even when someone deregisters during the school or academic year, this is automatically entered in the database.

The needed electronic chain involves 225.000 certificates each year. In terms of technical data, it is one of the longest electronic chains in Belgium. It starts with the educational institutions and runs via the educational administration through the Flemish MAGDA platform for data exchange to the Federal KSZ, the Federal child benefit funds and the payment offices.

Fine-tuning all these links to one another is not just a technical tour de force. We also had to steer the communication between the partners in the right direction and have each party commit to paying part of the costs. Moreover, we had to build in guarantees so as to avoid double payments or citizens not receiving any child benefit at all.

Technology solution

- Exchange protocol: XML/SOAP web services
- Exchange platform: MAGDA platform for data exchange, Crossroads Bank for Social Security

Impact, innovation and results

Impact

This project is an example of E-government in top gear: the government completes the entire process fully automatically, and as such relieves citizens from all the work. Children under 18 are of school age and as a result the government automatically pays child benefit to the parents. When their children turned 18, parents had to apply for child benefit themselves by means of a form they received from the school or university concerned.

The advantage for the individual citizen is abundantly clear: he or she is released from the annual duty of completing the application form and of making sure that it reaches its destination in time.

Advantages for the administration: especially the child benefit funds will have less work. This prospect motivated them to help invest in this process. Just think of the time and energy you save when you no longer have to process 220,000 forms manually!

The advantage for the government lies in the fact that the process greatly reduces the number of errors. This should, among other things, result in fewer erroneous payments and consequently fewer recoveries.

Large impact on all bodies involved (federal and regional)
- Schools
- Department of Education
- Child benefit funds
- Child benefit payment offices

These bodies must switch over to the entirely electronic processing of 220,000 paper dossiers (for all pupils enrolled in Dutch-language education). From the first year onwards over 90% of the total number of dossiers are processed electronically

Lessons learnt

Lesson 1 - The most important tip is to work together with specialised partners in the field of data exchange. Because of this support, pitfalls are avoided.

Leson 2 - Spend sufficient time on a thorough analysis of your project. This is even more important in a project which is co-financed by different partners: in case of unexpected setbacks, there is always the risk of a partner withdrawing from the project.

Lesson 3 - Spend a lot of time on communication. The partners must be made well aware from the very beginning where you are heading and that their investment will make a profit. In addition they must really trust one another. It is essential to involve senior officials from each of the institutions concerned. Coordination between the commissioning bodies and the technical partners must be optimal as well. Another very important aspect is the communication between the different implementing bodies within the Flemish government, the federal government and the child benefit funds.

Multimedia Content Select a Tab

There isn't any image for this case

There isn't any Video for this case

practice Automatic payment of child benefit