In December 2006, a decision was made at the European level that every company should have the opportunity to offer its services all over Europe; this decision came to be known as the EU Services Directive. Separately, another initive has recently kicked off in Germany called the Standardized Citizens Service Line D 115, the intention being to offer a single number that German citizens can dial and be able to make all types of enquires on public services.

The political objectives are the reduction of bureaucratic obstacles and interstate constraints as well as the fundamental modernization of European public administrations. With these goals as a background, the EU Services Directive requires a single point of contact, which must also be accessible electronically. The latter represents an authority, which, accessible via different ways, competently provides information, consults and coordinates a business start-up. Every member state independently implements these single points of contact. The prerequisite is an intelligent use of IT-Technology and the integration of different processes of public administrations to support this entity – whether human or system – in an appropriate way.

Microsoft collaborated with the Fraunhofer Institute to build out a demonstrator in their lab in Germany that is a prototype of what a solution that addresses the EU Services Directive and D115 challenges.  This work is an early reference for Microsoft forthcoming Citizen Service Platform which was announced at our Government Leaders Forum in Berlin this year.

Detailed documentation in English, parts of the source code as well as the description of computer architecture of the prototype are available for download on this site here. The same documentation is available in German from the Solutions Sharing Network (SSN) - Platform of the German Association of Towns and Municipalities www.dstgb-interkommunal.de.

This prototype provides a metaform to be used for the registration of a business, trade, or service, with which all required data or documents can be collected. All application data received is centrally administrated and allocated to all authorities involved in the process via integration of their respective software components. For the required point of single contact, a role-based workplace was created, which supports the person in charge throughout the process and provides access to a range of components like task lists, case management and directory services but also to telephony and internet. A process management environment in the background controls the distribution of information and ensures the integration of special procedures required for more complex cases, e.g. in the area of business or vehicle registration. The entire prototype uses XML-structured data and communicates over web services interfaces with all integrated components.

Enjoy!