@IEG4

www.ieg4.com

DIGITAL NOW Cloud &

Mobile First

Why delivering

services from the

cloud on to all

devices should be

at the forefront of

your digital

strategy.

CityNext is Microsoft’s global flagship programme for

accelerating transformation and engagement in the public

sector.

CityNext

Cities and their people are the hearts

and souls of our nations.

For the first time in history, more than

50 percent of the world’s population

live in urban areas, and the steady

growth in urbanization means that

cities are facing a variety of new

opportunities and challenges.

It is forecast that by 2050 more than

70 percent of the world population will

live in urban areas, accounting for an

additional 2.7 billion urban dwellers.

Cities need to do new with less to

deliver citizen-centric services that

scale. Because at their core, cities are

about people.

By 2050, 70% of

the world’s

population will

live in cities.

Cities are

responsible for

80% of the

world’s energy

consumption.

Public-sector

spending on mobile

technologies is

expected to grow by

4.5% in 2015.

Here at IEG4 we look at things differently. We don’t try to do what someone else has done a little differently. We try to understand how an organisation operates, and could operate, if the technology was there to facilitate it. We like to ask ‘Why?’. Why does something have to be done in a certain way? Why does a user have to provide the information more than once? Why do citizens have to wait for an online account to be set up? Why can’t we verify their status and identity in real time? Why can’t decisions on applications be automated?

By understanding the answers, we look to formulate the ideal software solutions that complement the way organisations want to work and even identify new areas of efficiency / enhanced customer experience. With our solutions, we seeks to create phenomenal, never before conceived digital services.

Digital services have become ubiquitous in our personal lives and,

within the public sector, a facilitator of change and efficiency. It is for

this reason that they need ‘Digital by Design’. By this I mean that a

digital service needs to be easier to use, speed up turnaround times and

maximize administrative efficiencies. It should not simply be a tick in a

box, it should bring value, an improvement in service delivery and

afford flexibility of working practice.

Winston Churchill once said, “To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often”. I hope that this excerpt from our Digital Now magazine illustrate our desire to do precisely this with REG. To challenge expectations and deliver something that surprises and wows.

Enjoy the read!

Editor

John McMahon

Product Director

@IEG4

john.mcmahon@ieg4.com

From providing a response on whether I will need an umbrella today, or to automatically alert me that I should use an alternative route due to live traffic conditions, personal online assistants are becoming key differentiators in the operating systems that Microsoft, Apple and Google provide. Services like Siri, Google’s Now and Cortana showcase how a user can be assisted with context driven queries using intelligence and data known about the user. These services provide assistance to queries on smartphones/tablets when data is provided about the user, their location and their activities/tasks. But why is it that there is a glaring omission in this same area to help citizens with questions relating to queries within the public sector? By understanding who a citizen is, their family, their income/benefits and where they live, surely it is possible to facilitate such queries in real time in the same user friendly way afforded to them by consumer facing services. So it is with so many pioneering trends that move from the private to public sector world, the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to service customers more quickly and better is a natural one. The use of artificial intelligence, automation of tasks using robotic automation and the tracking of these service requests, is the key to delivering the next generation of eGovernment. It is for this reason we designed and built REG (Robotically Empowered Government). REG not only understands what a user may want, he has the ability to update processing systems in the same way a human would too. Without getting overly technical, the best online services integrate in real time with back office systems using Application Processing Interfaces (APIs). However, these are inherently binary. They either update a case with the information from an online form or not, and always for a very specific purpose. This in turn means that while the data is updated in the back office there is normally a verification or approval process by someone in the Council before the data is fully processed. Notwithstanding these functional limitations, APIs are very expensive when bought from software suppliers. REG, however, will handle exceptions to the rule so that someone does not need to check the data. Where a citizen’s circumstances are such that an alternative route should be taken this is handled in the process. A simple example would be a citizen setting up a direct debit online. There are circumstances in which one would not want this process to be automated such as where the person’s payment history or recovery status is poor. These cannot be handled by current API based systems and as such require every update to be checked, which in turn leads to continued administration and slower turnaround times. REG can be told what to do in all circumstances and effectively mimic the behaviour of a human processing a case. So if the citizen should not be allowed to set up a direct debit they can be told in real time that this is the case and what they must do before this can be done. If the data received in one online forms means that another should be processed in another department, then this can be automated in the same way.

Cofely are leading providers of integrated services - specialising in energy, technical, FM & business process solutions for the built environment. In December 2013, the company acquired Balfour Beatty Workplace and now has a partnership with North Tyneside Council providing services including Revenues & Benefits. North Tyneside Council has a population of over 200,000, around 10% of whom receive Housing Benefits. Cofely, on behalf of North Tyneside Council, went out to competitive tender for the provision of a housing benefit and revenues eforms solution for the North Tyneside Council website in February 2014. The business goals were to deliver improved access to online services for North Tyneside residents, to reduce demand on the Customer Services staff, and to improve communication to North Tyneside residents from the Council. After an intensely competitive process, IEG4 emerged as the unanimous choice of the project board. Martin Ruane, Cofely’s Programme Director, said: “At Cofely, we suspect that robotic software is the key to delivering the next generation of eGovernment. Automation provides the ability to update processing systems in the same way a human would, but many times more quickly. It’s also the case that when back office APIs can be very expensive and hugely impact business case savings, robotic software can provide a more cost effective alternative. “We were pleased to learn that IEG4 had experience of robotic software at Stockport Council and also shared out strategic view on the future of this disruptive technology in the local government marketplace. The technical teams have worked closely together to provide a state-of-the-art system which I am

Stockport Council are at the forefront of channel shift in the UK. They were the first Council to achieve 100% online for Housing Benefit claims fully integrated into the Civica OpenRevenues processing application and the Workflow EDMS. Indeed, in partnership with IEG4, they won the LGC IT Initiative of the Year Award in 2012 as a result of their successes. Using the guidance and practitioner knowledge of Stockport’s Revenues team REG has now learned everything about processing discounts, exemptions, direct debits and moves. So much so that for processes like Single Person Discounts there is no need for staff to look at these cases where benefit is not in payment. End to end processing can be carried out on most processes and it is only the exceptions to the rule where users require to take action. The beauty of using robotic automation is that exceptions in the process are minimal because it is possible to tell the robot what to do in different circumstances. So if, for example, Stockport have an operational process for dealing with accounts at a certain recovery stage, this can be built in and only those circumstances which must require user intervention are set as exceptions. It is anticipated that the robotic automation will be able to fully automate up to 60% of transactions and so will afford a phenomenal amount of efficiency savings.