How can e-Governance help its citizens

     People today are very busy and constantly on the go with all different types of things going on in their life. How can the implementation of e-Governance help its citizens when they need something from the public service? Years ago you would go to the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) office and wait sometimes for hours simply to talk to someone than have to fill out paperwork and it was a very long process. Now with the implementation of online systems you can fill out the paperwork before hand and streamline the whole process. You can have the paperwork filled out and be in and out of there within a few minutes as opposed to the old system of grabbing a number and waiting until someone can give you a form. This is a huge benefit to both the employee and the citizens that frequent these places for things they need. As society becomes more technologically advanced systems like these will become more of the norm and it is up to the up and coming public administrators and stewards of the government to keep up with the times as well. When properly implementing simple systems such as this or paying a ticket online instead of going to see a clerk to pay it things will run more smoothly.

     When implementing online websites to help the public it is important to set a proper budget as we can look at one recent example and regardless of your political affiliation both sides can agree it exceeded its budget. That of course was the implementation of the Affordable Health Care Act (AHCA) website which had costs of over 1 billion dollars. This website was made to help Americans sign up for the new insurance plan former President Obama had passed (AHCA) and I am not here to discuss the plan but rather the major mishap that ended up costing over a billion dollars in tax paying money to set up a website which should have cost nowhere near that amount. This needs to serve as a reminder going forward with the implementation of public services online that there needs to be strict monitoring and guidelines that will not cost the tax payers hundreds of millions of dollars to simply set up a website not actually provide the service. Some of the additional funds were necessary but there needs to be clear transparency to the public when setting up something that directly affects the public and e-Governance can do just that.

“According to Woods’ testimony, the cost of building one part of HealthCare.gov increased from $56 million to more than $209 million between September 2011 and February 2014. Expenses for the associated data hub ballooned from $30 million to $85 million. Woods says that by March 2014, CMS reported “obligating $840 million for the development of HealthCare.gov and its supporting systems” (Pickert, 2014).

Reference:
Pickert, K. (2014, July 30). Report: Cost of HealthCare.Gov Approaching $1 Billion. Retrieved June 18, 2017, from http://time.com/3060276/obamacare-affordable-care-act-cost/

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