Seocho-gu QR Code Electronic Civil Petition Form Recognized for Smart Civil Administration

District, Ministry of the Interior and Safety Host 'Digital Local Government Best Practice Competition' Grand Prize Winner... Only One in Seoul
...Nation's First 'Digital Civil Service Window Using Electronic Civil Petition Form System' Highly Praised for Fast and Convenient Smart Civil Service Administration... Reduced Waiting and Processing Times, Decreased Paper Applications, and Administrative Cost Savings Garner Positive Feedback

S Seocho-gu, the only autonomous district in Seoul certified as a smart city both domestically and internationally, has been recognized for its excellence in smart civil service administration incorporating 4th industrial revolution technologies.

Seocho-gu, Seoul (Mayor Jeon Seong-su) received the Grand Prize at the ‘Digital Local Government Best Practice Competition’ held on the 2nd for its ‘Nation’s First Digital Civil Service Window Utilizing Electronic Civil Petition Form System.’ This award is the only one given to a Seoul local government by the Ministry of the Interior and Safety.

The competition, held at the Daejeon Convention Center, was organized for the first time this year by the Ministry of the Interior and Safety to discover and disseminate excellent cases of public service improvement using digital technology across all local governments.

In September, the Ministry conducted a preliminary review based on four criteria: necessity, expertise, originality, and effectiveness, selecting five local governments for the finals. On the 2nd, the final winners were chosen and awarded through case presentations.

Seocho-gu presented its ‘Digital Civil Service Window Utilizing Electronic Civil Petition Form System,’ introduced nationwide for the first time in June this year, and was recognized for providing residents with fast and convenient smart civil service administration suited to the digital era. It received particular praise for ‘reducing civil petition waiting and processing times,’ ‘eco-friendly administration’ by drastically reducing paper application forms, and ‘administrative cost reduction’ by directly transmitting electronic forms to staff PCs.

This service allows civil petitioners visiting the OK Civil Service Center to conveniently handle their tasks using smartphones and QR codes during waiting times.

Specifically, the application form written by the petitioner via a URL sent to their smartphone is converted into an encrypted QR code, which is then transmitted to the staff’s PC through a scanner reader, enabling prompt processing.

A district official stated, “After about four months of operation, processing time was reduced by approximately 50% compared to before, and about 97% of respondents expressed satisfaction in a survey. Currently, benchmarking requests are pouring in from 30 local governments.”

The district is currently advancing the system to provide the electronic civil petition form service using smartphones and QR codes more broadly and conveniently to residents. The planned enhancements include ▲expanding the types of electronic civil petition services from the existing 79 to 199, including civil affairs at community service centers ▲extending from self-application to delegated application ▲establishing smart community service centers, all scheduled for completion by the first half of next year.

The competition was held as part of the ‘2023 Korea Local Era Expo.’ Seocho-gu set up a promotional booth at the Daejeon Convention Center where the AI civil service guide robot ‘Haengboki’ welcomed visitors, and an electronic civil petition form experience corner attracted much attention.

Meanwhile, in July, Seocho-gu reopened the ‘Smart OK Civil Service Center,’ incorporating digital technology to provide customized civil services suited to the digital environment. The center features the electronic civil petition form service, a ‘Smart Integrated Queue Waiting System’ with a large monitor for easy queue status viewing, the AI civil service guide robot ‘Haengboki,’ the ‘Smart OK Zone’ housing various digital civil service devices, and a digital photo zone using QR codes to capture memories such as marriage registration or visiting the district office.

Jeon Seong-su, Mayor of Seocho-gu, said, “We are pleased that the digital civil petition form system utilization project has been nationally recognized. We will continue to strive to provide differentiated smart administrative services so that residents can enjoy a comfortable daily life.”

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