Isle of Man Government has today announced the results of an independent benchmarking exercise for its online information and services as part of its continued efforts to measure online performance and to determine priorities for the digital strategy.
In summary, the assessment found that:
- The Island’s focus on having a single, accessible web presence – Gov.im was a major reason for it being rated as the “best in Europe” for mobile access.
- The Island has solid technical foundations for its online services and existing services benchmark well.
- Overall the Island performs slightly below the average for all events measured due to the lack of services that can be fully accessed online with the ability to start a business using online channels being the Island’s weakest service measured.
Hon. John Shimmin MHK, Minister for Policy and Reform said
'As well as considerable local input to the Digital Strategy, this benchmark provided the opportunity to get objective feedback and learn about the online services that European Governments are prioritising.’
Mr Shimmin continued
‘Whilst we should be pleased with the positive findings such as mobile access and income tax, we clearly need to do more in other areas to take advantage of the opportunities digital services present. Action is already underway to improve our digital services for both citizens and businesses which in turn underpin our economic growth and the benchmark highlighted the gap we have in supporting businesses activities through digital channels.’
‘The Digital Strategy will launch initiatives to assist businesses such as new online systems for the Companies, Ship and Aircraft Registries. We will introduce services to help new businesses set up more quickly, assist employers to find suitable employees and individuals to find the right job opportunities. A new online work permits system will also further reduce the administrative burden on employers and improve the efficiency of the process.’
Mr Shimmin concluded
‘As a result, I am confident we can build on the solid foundations we already have to improve Government’s performance in digital services quite quickly and I look forward to bringing the Digital Strategy to June’s Tynwald.’
Director of Government Technology Services, Mark Lewin said
‘The biggest message coming from the benchmark is that whilst the online services we already provide are good, and in some cases such as mobile access, lead the whole of Europe, the quantity of services available must increase. This supports what we heard through the focus groups, through industry input and through the public survey which saw over 70% of respondents supporting the need for more services to be available through digital channels.’
The benchmarking was conducted independently by one of Europe’s leading technology consultancies – Capgemini Consulting who extended their European Commission sponsored benchmark of 33 European countries to include the Isle of Man and although the final report is not yet released by the European Commission, an executive summary is now available or from the Welcome Centre.
Additional Information
- The benchmark measured online service performance for seven real life events: ‘Starting a business’, ‘Regular business operations’, ‘Losing and finding a job’, ‘Owning and driving a car’, ‘Studying’, ‘Moving’ and ‘Small Claims’.
- The results show that even though the Isle of Man could bring more services online, the ease and speed of using these services compares to the EU average, indicating an attitude of 'quality over quantity'
- In terms of technology, Gov.im compared well to the rest of Europe particularly for its unified Government website and joined up services for enrolled customers. The huge amount of information available online through one website was also praised.
- The report highlighted the work needed to achieve the maturity levels of other countries in terms of breadth of services and fully automated self-service options and outlined five areas to focus on:
- Be service minded.
- 'Organise public services around the customer instead of around government. Apply the concept of life events to focus the customer journey of citizens and businesses on the Isle of Man.'
- Be service minded.
- Deliver on the potential of technology enablers.
- 'Enable more online transactions through online authentication. Bring more services online. Currently, only few fully online transactions are available. Users will expect more, and there is room to deliver on their expectations, especially where it concerns business start-ups. Key technological enabler to accelerate this process is electronic identification (eID).'
- Open up.
- 'Meet expectations from customers who want to be informed about the service delivery process (time, duration, response deadlines etc) enabling entrepreneurs and citizens to use digital services when and where most convenient.'
- Collaborate and join-up.
- 'Designing services around user’s needs also includes mapping the customer journeys to understand how customers typically interact with various government channels, functional silos and technical solutions.'
- Continuously develop skills.
- 'Both user skills - the extent to which the Isle of Man population is capable of using technology, going online, etc. - as well as skills of the civil servants and leaders of the Isle of Man government.'
