The City of Hanau digitises its processes with ServiceNow CRM

Platformization with ServiceNow

According to the OZG (Online Access Act), all administrative services must be available and processed digitally. In addition to regulatory requirements, this not only makes public administration more efficient, but also more citizen-friendly. Even before the introduction of the OZG, the City of Hanau had already decided to digitise its administration with ServiceNow.

Why ServiceNow?

1. Platformization: ServiceNow has the advantage of being more than just IT software. It is a holistic solution that transcends individual departments. This is because potentially anything can be implemented on the Now platform.
2. Further development and modernisation: ServiceNow always has its finger on the pulse and offers solutions within the platform that are up to date and ensure modern working practices. Processes can be redesigned and implemented again and again.
3. Fast problem solving: ServiceNow has achieved a standard and position in the market that enables technical problems to be solved quickly and easily. Employees and experts can be trained on ServiceNow without any problems, and there are standard solutions that are immediately available.
4. Service portal & user interface: At the time of the decision, ServiceNow was one of the few providers that included a service portal (online presence). It also has a simple front end for the corresponding back end to reduce the user barrier. Anyone can work in it.

Use case City of Hanau: Challenges and solutions

Challenge – Municipal Standard Tool:

After the Online Access Act (OZG) was enacted, support and guidelines came from the state in the form of a tool developed specifically for municipalities. At the time, it was launched without any platform concept or user interface and without any standards. As a result, not all of the City of Hanau’s processes could be digitally mapped, and problems could only be solved by a few specialists. This was a lengthy and complicated process that also halted the implementation of ServiceNow.

Solution:

ServiceNow was implemented where the other tool could not be used. This allowed momentum to be harnessed and the increased workload on employees to be counteracted. Some processes outside the OZG were implemented with ServiceNow. These include police reporting, issue management, and holiday game registration.

Challenge – Convincing stakeholders:

Processes in the public sector have grown organically and are complexly interconnected. Government agencies have developed their own ways of making decisions with each other and across departments, distributing tasks, and resolving issues. The biggest challenge was to bring all agencies together with their needs and create an understanding of process automation, which had previously been done manually and individually.

Solution:

Empower employees! It was particularly important to alleviate employees’ fears about digitalisation through training and personal support. Therefore, it was especially important to find the right partner who could engage with individuals and drive progress step by step.

Specific use cases

Citizen portal / Issue management:

Citizens can independently create a ticket with their request on the citizen portal. It is then processed across departments: all offices and departments can work on one portal. Examples of requests include: a traffic light at a certain intersection is not working. This solution was implemented with ServiceNow CSM. The number of requests processed has increased by 250 per year.

Bulky waste process with ServiceNow CRM:

The request for bulky waste collection falls outside the scope of issue management, as it is a clear appointment arrangement. More mandatory information is required for an appointment request in order to provide the service correctly (e.g., extra carts for electronic waste). Before the switch to ServiceNow, requests were sent to the city of Hanau by mail, which was a barrier for many citizens. As a result, requests for bulky waste collection increased immensely after the switch. Before the transformation, approximately 2,000 requests were received by mail each year; now, approximately 6,000 requests are received digitally each year.

Wastewater management with a custom app:

Before switching to ServiceNow, water test values were documented using custom software. The disadvantage was that the database could only be opened by one employee at a time, meaning that other people could not access it while it was in use. With the custom app, which largely draws on the platform capabilities of ServiceNow, it is now possible to:

• to access it at the same time by everyone
• create invoices directly from the app (semi-automated)
• maintain even more data

Police reporting:

In this case, it involves the digital documentation of reports from the regulatory police. The advantage? Evaluations at the click of a mouse! During the coronavirus pandemic, for example, it was important to know how many coronavirus violations had occurred in a given period. Before digitisation with ServiceNow, a police officer had to go through and evaluate the reports manually—an incredible effort that took several days. Now, with digital documentation, this evaluation can be done in just a few clicks.

Holiday games organisation:

To make the organisation of the holiday games more efficient, a custom app based on ServiceNow was developed. There is now an online registration form for participants, and the app is used to manage the work schedule for employees. In addition, proof of hours worked (the basis for the billing tool) is documented, and invoices for participants are generated semi-automatically from the app. No more MS Excel, no more MS Word: documentation, file creation, collection of customer data, and so on, now all take place in one app, minimising the amount of work involved.