right direction to reduce user fear as
perception is truth in people’s minds.
KRA offers diverse channels like the
contact center, an interactive website, and
portals for customers to reach out to them.
This is one public sector organization
that despite its role, just like Zacchaeus
after meeting Jesus, perception is rising
positively. They have certainly gone the
extra mile as service providers making the
user experience more friendly as it is now
a one stop shop. The user journey is better
defined and tested without necessary back
and forth. Each step is well defined and
anticipated challenges are well mitigated.
A lot of work though still needs to go to
customer education, and contact center
capability to address the citizen queries
and use of data to create a linked and
centralized end to end platform where the
users can actually view all consolidated tax
obligations generated from their unique
PIN.
The immigration department has made
great strides in the portal for application
of passports. Though this is not the only
core job assigned to them, this is where
their brand touches the ordinary citizens
more. The user experience is good albeit a
few hiccups on uploading documents.
However this good experience ends here.
The digital experience breaks and one
The public sector is
perceived to have
little or no under-
standing of the need
to accord its citizens
good service particu-
larly in Africa where
Governments dictate
the services citizens
should receive. In
most instances, Gov-
ernment staff work
in a robotic way to
clear the hours or
more so to ensure
some level of service
has been delivered.
62 MAL33/19 ISSUE
KRA is leading in offering online services
with a satisfactory score for those who re-
quire their services. Tax matters are com-
plex and intimidating to citizens. The nu-
merous campaigns for customer education
are definitely big leaps in the right direction
to reduce user fear as perception is truth in
people’s minds. KRA offers diverse channels
like the contact center, an interactive web-
site, and portals for customers to reach out
to them.
has to go back to the manual process
which negates the digitization process
and experience. The fact that after going
online one has to print out the hard
copies, spare hours despite an allocated
appointment to go queue from office to
office is a bad customer experience. A
simple generation of a customer unique
reference code would save us the hassle of
printing, queuing and wasting resources
both in time and cost.
A simple integrated system should pull
the finger print verification from the
integrated population registration services
to save time. There is massive opportunity
in the Immigration department in
training the personnel to understand they
are giving service and they should be more
proactive and alive to the fact that they are
not doing citizens a favor.
Public institutions should borrow a leaf
from banks and see how competition,
technology and discerning customers
changed processes like opening an account
when we used to provide documents upon
documents to deposit our hard earned
money.
Walking into a police station is perhaps
every citizen’s biggest nightmare and I
mean even when you are on the good side
of the law. The first experience is a pungent
smell emanating from the rooms behind
the counter never mind the aesthetics. The
police officers body language as they call
you madam is quite telling.
The first lesson for our police stations
is that the culture to serve must change
and the tone cannot be set at the touch-
point. It must trickle down from the top.
Our police officers need to be trained in
serving all, and the unit should transform
from a ‘police force’ to a ‘police service’
in the real sense of the word beyond the
slogan.
Automation of the Occurrence Book is a
project that has taken longer than expected
in creating good experiences. Today with
off-the-shelve technology this should
not be a project that should cost citizens
billions of cash. Let us start small and roll
out organically.
The Ministry of Lands and Physical
Planning is probably the hotbed of poor
customer experience. Buying and selling
land is a messy process that is fragmented,
infiltrated by external players coupled with
enough points of failure in the system. A
process that is not seamless will always
create room for cartels and fraudsters.
In my view, there is a need to overhaul
all these processes and assign them to a
single point of authority. What is deemed
as automation, though a step in the right
direction, is a far cry from creating a user
journey that fulfils and protects the needs
of the citizens.
Service to citizens in the judiciary is a
true validation that justice delayed is
justice denied. Cases take years and years
to be heard defeating the purpose of
citizens seeking help and justice in courts.
Generations have died while pursuing
land disputes. The processes are more
based on the personal judge instead of the
institution. If a judge is transferred before
reassigning a case it means your case can
only be heard perhaps after another year if
you are lucky.
This is one area where citizens have
resigned to fate when it comes to service
delivery. Automation is close to nil and
almost all information is handwritten so
never panic if your case history disappears.