Done – as a contested
proposed deletion, the article has been restored on request.
iSAC (Citizens Attention Service)is an on-line SAC (Citizens Attention Service)that has been designed following a citizen-centred, citizen-inclusive and community-centred approach. Its mission is to attend to citizens’ demands on-line, by retrieving and managing information from existing databases. This reinforces traditional face-to-face and telephone SACs, which have been offered in local administrations in Catalonia, Spain, for over 20 years. iSAC has already been installed in 6 different local administrations in the Spanish autonomous region of Catalonia and is ready to be deployed in other European countries. Specifically, the service in Terrassa, a city of 200.000 inhabitants 35km from Barcelona, has been working since December 2006 at
http://isac.terrassa.org, and currently provides response to queries that number up to 1/3 of the queries processed by the SAC city council phone services. However, the existing great variety of local SAC and languages mandates additional resources such as semantic webs, and novel strategies such as innovative business models be developed in order to deploy the service at the European level.
The existing service is able to process different linguistic registers, such as colloquialisms or administrative jargon, in Catalan and Spanish, and answers open questions from citizens. It facilitates human intervention when necessary, working towards a better integration of back-office and front-office. The service is modular and designed to be easily tailored to the needs of any target organisation, and it has built-in learning capacities which improve through continuous use.
The Usage of the Service
A typical usage case from citizens point of view is described by the following steps:
1.Formulation of questions.
Citizens’ questions are submitted through the organisation website. Any linguistic register (i.e. colloquial, specialised etc.) can be used. iSAC is able to process either single words, a set of keywords or complex sentences. Localisms and orthographic errors are also deciphered.
2.Provision of answers
A preliminary answer is provided, unless the question is not understood, or there is no clear information to be retrieved. It can be a provisory set of answers, in which iSAC asks the user to clarify the questions in terms of language, grammar, etc. In that case iSAC will retrieve the pertinent information again, to formulate a new answer.
3.Language recognition
The service identifies a citizen’s language and asks for confirmation before proceeding in that language.
4.Database confirmation
iSAC allows citizens to limit the number of results by selecting one or several sets by which the relevant database is organised, such as legislation or local resources; citizens may also fine tune results by street, date, type of data, etc.
5.Provision of answers as described in Step 1
6.Human intervention
If no results were identified in the available database, an alternative path is offered: an on-demand phone call-back, an SMS or an e-mail message, iSAC also allows the user to reformulate the question by using other terms or by refining the question.
7.Information from other users
When no result is available, the user can formulate the question on a wiki. Thus, questions may be answered by registered users on the basis of their own experience and needs.
8.Service evaluation
Finally, the citizen is asked for feedback, in the form of a very brief evaluation following the answers. A certain percentage of users will be invited to fill out a questionnaire about the service, to provide more detailed feedback on the effectiveness of the service. All feedback notes will get a response from the SAC staff. The existing service evaluation module of the iSAC service in Terrassa (feedback) will be adapted to the iSAC6+ objectives.
Impact
The Citizen Interface Challenge
Local administrations are the target of most citizens’ questions. This is due to their local proximity, the variety of responsibilities they carry and the awareness among the general population that the local administrations exist. Questions are often formulated in colloquial language rather than in administrative jargon, have a heterogeneous nature and sometimes fall outside the scope of the municipality itself.
Availability of quick and easy access to information is essential to promote a better understanding of administrative requirements, health services or applications for benefits. iSAC will provide “24hours/365days” and “easy-to-use” on-line service to access information. Its deployment at the European level will significantly contribute to a reduction of time, resources, money and stress from administrative burdens for citizens in search of information.
The Business Interchange Challenge
According to a recent survey among European SMEs [1] , the top ranked constraint exporters faced was lack of information: 13% of those SMEs answering this question said they lacked knowledge of possibly compatible foreign markets.
iSAC has not been designed to provide detailed and specialised information on business-related topics in particular. However, it might help to solve simple and specific queries from SMEs or freelance product and service providers, such as: “What should I do with my old computer?” or “How can I get the permit to open my shop?”
Therefore, iSAC will also reduce administrative burdens for businesses, especially SMEs, which are in search of information, and thus will tackle the business interchange challenge.
Links
http://www.isac.cat
http://www.isac.cat/en/docs/iSAC-eng.pdf
- ^ Observatory of European SMEs. Exectutive Summary. Fieldwork of the survey: November 06 – January 07. Flash Eurobarometer, European Commission.
Done – as a contested
proposed deletion, the article has been restored on request.
iSAC (Citizens Attention Service)is an on-line SAC (Citizens Attention Service)that has been designed following a citizen-centred, citizen-inclusive and community-centred approach. Its mission is to attend to citizens’ demands on-line, by retrieving and managing information from existing databases. This reinforces traditional face-to-face and telephone SACs, which have been offered in local administrations in Catalonia, Spain, for over 20 years. iSAC has already been installed in 6 different local administrations in the Spanish autonomous region of Catalonia and is ready to be deployed in other European countries. Specifically, the service in Terrassa, a city of 200.000 inhabitants 35km from Barcelona, has been working since December 2006 at
http://isac.terrassa.org, and currently provides response to queries that number up to 1/3 of the queries processed by the SAC city council phone services. However, the existing great variety of local SAC and languages mandates additional resources such as semantic webs, and novel strategies such as innovative business models be developed in order to deploy the service at the European level.
The existing service is able to process different linguistic registers, such as colloquialisms or administrative jargon, in Catalan and Spanish, and answers open questions from citizens. It facilitates human intervention when necessary, working towards a better integration of back-office and front-office. The service is modular and designed to be easily tailored to the needs of any target organisation, and it has built-in learning capacities which improve through continuous use.
The Usage of the Service
A typical usage case from citizens point of view is described by the following steps:
1.Formulation of questions.
Citizens’ questions are submitted through the organisation website. Any linguistic register (i.e. colloquial, specialised etc.) can be used. iSAC is able to process either single words, a set of keywords or complex sentences. Localisms and orthographic errors are also deciphered.
2.Provision of answers
A preliminary answer is provided, unless the question is not understood, or there is no clear information to be retrieved. It can be a provisory set of answers, in which iSAC asks the user to clarify the questions in terms of language, grammar, etc. In that case iSAC will retrieve the pertinent information again, to formulate a new answer.
3.Language recognition
The service identifies a citizen’s language and asks for confirmation before proceeding in that language.
4.Database confirmation
iSAC allows citizens to limit the number of results by selecting one or several sets by which the relevant database is organised, such as legislation or local resources; citizens may also fine tune results by street, date, type of data, etc.
5.Provision of answers as described in Step 1
6.Human intervention
If no results were identified in the available database, an alternative path is offered: an on-demand phone call-back, an SMS or an e-mail message, iSAC also allows the user to reformulate the question by using other terms or by refining the question.
7.Information from other users
When no result is available, the user can formulate the question on a wiki. Thus, questions may be answered by registered users on the basis of their own experience and needs.
8.Service evaluation
Finally, the citizen is asked for feedback, in the form of a very brief evaluation following the answers. A certain percentage of users will be invited to fill out a questionnaire about the service, to provide more detailed feedback on the effectiveness of the service. All feedback notes will get a response from the SAC staff. The existing service evaluation module of the iSAC service in Terrassa (feedback) will be adapted to the iSAC6+ objectives.
Impact
The Citizen Interface Challenge
Local administrations are the target of most citizens’ questions. This is due to their local proximity, the variety of responsibilities they carry and the awareness among the general population that the local administrations exist. Questions are often formulated in colloquial language rather than in administrative jargon, have a heterogeneous nature and sometimes fall outside the scope of the municipality itself.
Availability of quick and easy access to information is essential to promote a better understanding of administrative requirements, health services or applications for benefits. iSAC will provide “24hours/365days” and “easy-to-use” on-line service to access information. Its deployment at the European level will significantly contribute to a reduction of time, resources, money and stress from administrative burdens for citizens in search of information.
The Business Interchange Challenge
According to a recent survey among European SMEs [1] , the top ranked constraint exporters faced was lack of information: 13% of those SMEs answering this question said they lacked knowledge of possibly compatible foreign markets.
iSAC has not been designed to provide detailed and specialised information on business-related topics in particular. However, it might help to solve simple and specific queries from SMEs or freelance product and service providers, such as: “What should I do with my old computer?” or “How can I get the permit to open my shop?”
Therefore, iSAC will also reduce administrative burdens for businesses, especially SMEs, which are in search of information, and thus will tackle the business interchange challenge.
Links
http://www.isac.cat
http://www.isac.cat/en/docs/iSAC-eng.pdf
- ^ Observatory of European SMEs. Exectutive Summary. Fieldwork of the survey: November 06 – January 07. Flash Eurobarometer, European Commission.