HCM City (VNS/VNA) – Ho Chi Minh City’sdistrict authorities and state offices are setting up hotlines, workingextra hours and visiting residents’ houses to provide publicadministrative procedures.

Since the beginning of the year, police inDistrict 9, for example, have visited seniors’ houses to give them anew plastic identity card that replaces their paper ID card.

The new plastic identity card, which wasfirst handed out in 2016 in 16 cities and provinces, will beissued throughout the country by 2020.

Tran Thi Xuan, whose husband suffered from astroke and could not go to the police, was notified by police. In early March,police visited Xuan to take a photo of her husband, who wasasked to fill out an application for the new ID card.

Police in districts 10 and Tan Binhand others have also been visiting the homes of seniors and people withdisabilities, and those living alone, to reduce their time and costs fortravel.

Lt Col Nguyen Viet Han, deputy head of thepolice division for management of administration and social order in District9, said a large number of migrants had caused the high demand for newcards. “They find it difficult to go to the district’s centre tochange cards,” he said.

The district police have delivered newidentity cards to 600 people at their homes.  

Also, for people who have moved to HCM Cityfrom another area, administrative offices now take only one dayinstead of three to process their household registration books.  

Tran Minh Tu, Chairman of the Hiep Binh Chanh Ward People’sCommittee in Thu Duc District, said the ward had set up two hotlinesmanaged by its police and committee.

Tu said when people call the hotlines, problemsare resolved within 10 seconds. “Officials must do thisjob better so that residents will trust officials,” he said.

Residents’ feedback helps officials knowfurther about what is happening in the ward, Tu said.

Hotline numbers are widely provided to allresidents in the ward, he added.

Many districts have set up their own phoneapplications to receive residents’ complaints and feedback aboutviolations in transport, environment, food safety and other fields.

Do Dinh Thien, Vice Chairman of the Binh TanDistrict People’s Committee, said that software now beingused contains detailed information about administrative proceduresand applications.

The district has also upgraded its portal toensure that it can be included on all devices.  

Nguyen Thanh Phong, Chairman of the HCM CityPeople’s Committee, said that customer satisfaction was a measurementof the city's effectiveness in solving administrative procedures.

At a recent meeting, Nguyen Thien Nhan, Secretaryof the HCM City Party Committee, said that HCM City targets having 80 percentcustomer satisfaction by 2020.

However, Phong said the quality of stateofficials working in administrative areas, as well as the cooperationbetween departments and agencies in administrative reform, was still weak.

The city has around 13 million peopleand 300,000 domestic and foreign enterprises.-VNS/VNA