Zitec study: The average degree of digitalization of Romanian town halls is 32.3 per cent

In November, Zitec, leader on the IT & digital marketing market in Romania, launched the Essential Guide for Digitalization of City Halls, developed by the Regista.ro team. In order to receive the document, interested municipalities must complete a questionnaire assessing their current degree of digitization. Based on this questionnaire, the Regista team aims to constantly monitor the general degree of digitalization of public administrations in Romania. The study is not exhaustive, given the rather low level of digitalization in our country, but aims to obtain an overview of the situation at the national level.

The initiative was well received, collecting about 100 questionnaires from 32 counties in just 3 weeks. Data collection efforts continue in the coming months, and we will update the data as we receive new responses or mayors implement various new digitization solutions.

According to the data collected so far, the average degree of digitalization of Romanian town halls is only 32.3%, a fact also revealed by the DESI report (The Digital Economy and Society Index) which indicates a slightly increasing trend of digitalization of public institutions in the last 3 years. In the chapter “Digital Public Services”, Romania is still on the last place at European level in 28 countries.

If some aspects of digitization have the role of streamlining and making transparent the activity of the institution and the interaction with the citizen, not being legally binding, certain aspects are clearly provided in the legislation. Thus, from January 2020, the mayoralties are obliged by the Administrative Code to publish the documents of public interest in the Local Official Gazette. However, only 70% of respondents comply with this provision. Similarly, according to GEO 38/2020, city halls must provide citizens with a public portal for receiving electronic documents. Only 24% of the municipalities participating in the study offer this facility.

The study conducted by the Regista team shows that three quarters of the participating mayoralties do not use in communication between employees and the public e-mail addresses with the mayor’s office, but personal addresses of employees, a practice that introduces numerous security risks and personal data protection. More than half of the institutions do not have electronic registration applications, but use physical registration, on paper.

On the other hand, there are enough town halls that have made serious efforts to move into the digital age. In almost 45% of the municipalities participating in the study, citizens can save time, avoiding queues and paying taxes online, and 65% of them use the electronic signature.

“After nine months of social distancing, we see that the level of digitalization of public administration is still particularly low, despite a legislative framework in place that includes obligations for these institutions on digitalization. Local government, as well as regional public institutions, need help to overcome this situation, both through modern software solutions and training in new technologies, such as electronic signatures or cloud solutions. The Regista team offers free consultancy on the digitization of interested public institutions “, said Alexandru Lăpușan, CEO and co-founder of Zitec.

The Regista study continues, and town halls across the country can assess their degree of digitization by completing the questionnaire, and will receive the Essential Guide to Digitizing City Hall. It includes general recommendations, from the verification of the hardware infrastructure, IT security, communication applications, to the use of e-Government applications and software solutions for the transparency of the activity and the efficiency of the public services offered to the citizens. Thus, through the Guide, Zitec continues to promote the digitalization of public institutions, in extension of the efforts of the Regista Caravan.

The Regista solution, developed by the Zitec team, is the market leader in the segment of registry applications and document management in the local public administration. The role of the application is to automate and streamline the activities of local institutions, government and companies, through electronic registration modules, document management and e-Government. The director facilitates both an optimal communication between the departments of an institution, as well as between officials and citizens, for a fast and much more organized resolution of the received requests.

To date, more than 550 public institutions and companies in all counties of the country have improved their work processes and reduced bureaucracy through Regista. The application has 10,000 users nationwide who have registered over 10 million documents over time.

The Regista solution, developed by the Zitec team, is the market leader in the segment of registry applications and document management in the local public administration. The role of the application is to automate and streamline the activities of local institutions, government and companies, through electronic registration modules, document management and e-Government. The director facilitates both an optimal communication between the departments of an institution, as well as between officials and citizens, for a fast and much more organized resolution of the received requests.

To date, more than 550 public institutions and companies in all counties of the country have improved their work processes and reduced bureaucracy through Regista. The application has 10,000 users nationwide who have registered over 10 million documents over time.

Regista application can be accessed from anywhere by civil servants or company employees, being available directly from the browser, without installation and with all information securely stored in the Microsoft Azure cloud.