Subject: Proposal for amendment of the Administrative Procedure Regulation - Removal of administrative barriers
The Regulation on Administrative Business (Official Journal of the Republic of Slovenia, No. 20/2005, 106/2005, 30/2006, 86/2006, 32/2007, 63/2007, 115/2007 (122/2007 am.), 31/2008, 35/2009, 58/2010 and 101/2010) - hereinafter referred to as the Regulation - in Article 127 lays down the rules for the recording of documentary material in electronic form, and, among other things, it also lays down the obligation to carry out internal controls on the scanning of documents, namely:
- a regular check of the scanning of documents must be carried out at least once every three months,
- an exceptional document scanning check must be carried out at least twice a year.
Thus, at least 6 internal document scanning checks (4 regular and 2 extraordinary) must be carried out within a period of one year, in strict compliance with the provisions of the Regulation.
Regular and extraordinary document scanning checks are regularly carried out at the Administrative Unit Novo mesto. However, the correctness of document scanning is checked on an ongoing basis, when cases are received for resolution. Any errors in scanning are corrected on an ongoing basis by the civil servants in the main office, and no major discrepancies have been detected in the regular and extraordinary controls of document scanning. Based on the reports on the regular and exceptional checks carried out, we have therefore found that in previous years there have been minimal or no discrepancies and no specific measures have been taken.
In the light of the experience gained in previous years, we consider that the provisions of the Regulation concerning the performance of regular and extraordinary scanning checks are inappropriate, as such frequent checks on the scanning of documents are unnecessary and constitute an administrative burden. The time and, consequently, the budgetary resources of the civil servants who are authorised to carry out internal controls are spent on each control, which is unnecessary in the light of the findings of the controls carried out in previous years and the austerity measures.
We propose to amend Article 127 of the Regulation as regards the obligation to carry out regular and extraordinary document scanning checks, so that document scanning checks should be carried out no more than twice a year.
Article 17 of the Regulation also refers to the quality assessment of customer service, stating that public administrations should carry out quality assessment procedures on customer service at least once every two years. We do not believe that the assessment of customer satisfaction in 2012 and 2013 will be realistic, given the expected increased waiting times for document replacement and the current austerity measures. Also, quality assessment requires additional time and, consequently, budgetary resources.
We propose to amend Article 17 of the Regulation so as to postpone the implementation of the quality of service assessment procedures for the customer service of public administrations until a time when austerity measures and economic growth will stabilise.