The 'e' development has for a number of years been a strategic focus on the Government level in Norway. This has resulted in the need for focus in this area on the operating level. The Norwegian Tax Administration has developed eServices since 1997. In 2001 The Norwegian Tax Administration decided to develop a dedicated program for the efiling called "Er@ - program for electronic reporting". The Er@-program encompasses several projects developing new electronic services. Most of the services are offered through the Altinn portal. The Altinn project was established in 2001 as a joint governmental project. The Norwegian Tax Administration was responsible for this project through the Er@ program, in co-operation with three leading government agencies. The goal was to develop a new internet portal, to communicate with businesses and citizens in a common 'look and feel' manner. By the end of 2004 ten different Government agencies are building new applications on top of the Altinn portal. This case focuses on some of the results from the Er@- program and the development of the Altinn portal.

Policy Context

- eNorway plan, (Ministry of Trade and Industry) - Action plan for simplifying Norway, (Ministry of Trade and Industry) - Strategy for ICT in the public sector, (Ministry of Labour and Government Administration) - Without pen and ink (Ministry of Labour and Government Administration) These government documents are focusing on promoting user-oriented services, reducing administrative burdens for citizens and businesses, and increasing efficiency at the local level.

Description of the way to implement the initiative

Several government administrations co-operating, developing common services. The Altinn portal is a very good example of the Norwegian government acting as one administration upon the end users (businesses and citizens). The experiences so far have shown that several government partners can manage to join in a common team, developing common services to the public. So far 10 different government administrations have connected to the Altinn platform, and there are still several to come. The process of developing the Altinn portal has involved several partners, not only the different government administrations. Several organisations, representing different user groups, have been included in a reference group. The organisations have brought different views and opinions into the process, and have therefore been very important participants in developing this platform. They have for example supplied the process with candidates representing the users (user testing). Including the different user organisations has had an enormous impact to the users in their acceptance and adoption to the Altinn portal. The portal is based on electronic forms initiated by the co-operation between the three government agencies, to co-ordinate and make the Norwegian Government in general look recognisable to the end users (businesses and citizens).

Main results, benefits and impacts

Increase in e-filing rates. Since the Er@ program was established in 2001 we have had the following increases in the different services: Tax Return Personal, Tax Return Corporate and VAT Return. These three services have had an average increase of 203% over three years!! All of the above-described services are offered through the Altinn portal. This gives a lot of synergies, and the end users find the services profitable because they experience recognition between the different services, and spend less time employing the electronic services compared to the traditional paper based services.

Return on investment

Return on investment: Not applicable / Not available

Track record of sharing

The latest award, The Norwegian Rosing Award, one of the most prominent awards given in the ICT industry in Norway, was given to the Altinn Portal this spring (April 2005), for the best eNorway candidate. After the Altinn portal was ready, spring 2004, several government administrations has connected to the platform. The Norwegian politicians have already concluded that the Altinn portal is an unconditional success, and use every relevant opportunity to recommend government administrations to connect to the platform. Altinn is a governmental locomotive to eServices upon the Norwegian public. By the same reason Altinn won the Rosing Award. The Altinn portal has also made an international impact. The Tax Administration has been invited to speak about Altinn in many occasions already. We attended a conference for the Shanghai Municipal Finance Burea in 2003, a conference in Canada in 2004, one in Helsinki Finland in March 2005 and we are invited to New Zealand in October 2005 to speak at a conference there. Our effort in making user oriented eServices, and the Altinn portal in especial, do have a relevance to other administrations, both nationally and internationally.

Lessons learnt

- Start with simple solutions - Good reactions from the public (the users) are important - Planning is important - Think holistic and stepwise when developing the services. - Connections to the basic existing IT-systems - Work to get internal effects - Attitudes: organisation - competence - remove barriers - To co-operate with other is important - Start with the most useful services - Think quality - do not compromise on quality of services. - Security and trust is important - safe channel - Have connection to legacy systems (professional systems) - Co-operate with other Civil Services - Think new - ask questions: Can it be done differently? What is needed to complete the service offered? Is it necessary to change the rules? Critical Success Factors for Tax eFiling - Common TIN (Personal Identification Number) - eFiling of Tax Information from three parties should be gathered electronically: Employers, Banks, Insurance/finance, Kindergartens, etc - Tax Forms preloaded with Tax Information - Simple and easy-to-use eServices for Tax Filing - Multiple Filing Channels: Paper, Internet, Telephone, SMS - Technological maturity of the Public - Private and public use of the Internet - Quality of Back-Office Systems Scope: National