Usage Rates of E-Government Services: Hometax > Government24 > Health Insurance... Disaster Relief Fund Awareness Reaches 95%

Ministry of the Interior and Safety Announces 2020 E-Government Service Usage Survey Results
Government24 Usage Soars 26.7%p Year-on-Year Due to COVID-19

[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Cheol-young] It has been revealed that 98% of users of e-government services, used by 9 out of 10 citizens, are satisfied with the services, and the usage rate of 'Government24' surged by nearly 27 percentage points (p) due to the COVID-19 situation. In particular, the awareness of the emergency disaster relief fund application and payment service, which received special attention, reached 95%, and the usage rate was found to be 74%.

On the 23rd, the Ministry of the Interior and Safety announced the results of a usage survey conducted in 2020 on awareness, usage rate, and satisfaction of e-government services. Awareness was 95.7%, usage rate 88.9%, and satisfaction 98.1%. These figures increased by 1.9%p, 1.3%p, and 0.3%p respectively compared to the previous year. By age group, the usage rate was highest among teenagers, and satisfaction was highest among people in their 20s. Notably, awareness among the digitally vulnerable group aged 60 and over rose by 9.3%p to 79% compared to the previous year.

The most used service was 'Hometax' at 86.5%, followed by Government24 (84.1%) and National Health Insurance (65.9%). Government24, which had a usage rate around 60%, increased by 26.7%p. This is interpreted as many citizens using the service to issue electronic certificates such as resident registration and transcript documents required for proxy purchase of public masks due to COVID-19.

Education-related services were most used by teenagers and people in their 40s, employment-related services by those in their 20s and 30s, childcare-related services by those in their 30s and 40s, and travel-related services showed higher usage among those aged 50 and above.

The channels through which people learned about e-government services were internet search (52.8%), family and acquaintances (50.7%), and media outlets (42.5%) in that order. Internet search (52.8%) and e-government promotional materials (22.3%) increased by 6.9%p and 11.1%p respectively compared to the previous year. By age group, those under 40 reported learning about the services through internet searches, advertisements, banners, blogs, and SNS, while those aged 50 and above said they learned through family, acquaintances, and government office staff.

In particular, awareness of the emergency disaster relief fund application and payment service was 95.4%, and usage rate was 73.8%, higher than other services. This is believed to be influenced by the government’s cooperation with nine credit card companies to provide relief funds to 99.5% of the entire population within one month. The services mainly used also varied by age group. Self-diagnosis services and remote education were mainly used by teenagers, confirmed patient movement tracking and public mask stock notification services by people in their 30s, and emergency disaster relief fund application and payment services showed higher usage among those aged 30 and above.

This year, the government plans to focus on digital government innovation by expanding the application of private certificates on websites operated by administrative and public institutions to enable citizens to use e-government services more conveniently.

Seo Joo-hyun, Director of the Digital Government Policy Division at the Ministry of the Interior and Safety, said, “Last year, the government actively utilized the e-government infrastructure to overcome the COVID-19 crisis by quickly accepting online applications for the emergency disaster relief fund from all citizens and opening public mask sales data to resolve the mask shortage early. This year, we are promoting services such as the National Secretary service, MyData, and mobile driver’s licenses, and we will continue to strive to provide more convenient e-government services to the public by utilizing the results of this survey.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.