Taking advantage of technological advances in IT and mobile phones, Metropolitan Corporation Lahore (MCL) has decided to apply a smart phone based solution named Fix-It for solving day-to-day problems being faced by the public representatives in the provincial capital.
The software Fix-It, designed by Punjab Information Technology Board (PITB), will be installed on the cell phones of public representatives, including chairman, deputy chairman and councillors of every union council through which they can sent alert regarding public and civic problems of their respective jurisdiction.
This smart solution was designed for citizens’ representatives allowing them to report civic problems (waste management, price control etc) with a single click, and is available on Android as well as iOS devices, alerting the concerned authorities to take action.
Using this software, the public representatives won’t have to bear the hassle of visiting the respective government department and launch a complaint to fix the problem. This is why the software is named as Fix-It, he said. The application itself does all the tough work at the back end and assign the problem to the right person informing him to take appropriate action at the right time, hence eliminating all the delays, he maintained.
Dr Umar Saif, Chairman PITB and Adviser to CM said:
Punjab Fix-It will help the newly-formed local governments to improve governance and resolve civic issues through technology intervention from grassroots level in Punjab
As a pilot project, the complaints can be made about three departments, including Metropolitan Corporation Lahore (MCL), Wasa (Water and Sanitation Agency) and LWMC (Lahore Waste Management Company). After the test run, the project will be introduced across the province, said Faisal Yousaf, Director General (IT Operations), PITB. He said public representatives can download this software from Google Play Store and it is very easy to install as well as operate.
A senior official of MCL said using this software chairman, vice- chairman and councillor in a union council can lodge complaints about price control, cleanliness, environmental pollution, broken roads, violation of building bylaws, kite-flying and etc. “A simple three step process is required to launch the complaint,” said Faisal Yousaf, adding the user selects the category of the complaint from a simple pictorial list, take a picture of the problematic site, provide some details and submit.
The automated system steps in from here and routes the complaint to the person concerned of the department, (initially LWMC, Wasa and LMC) automatically who is going to redress it, he said, adding this person has a different interface on the application whereby he can see the list of complaints that are assigned to him and starts the resolution process.
Once resolved, he will change the status of the complaint to ‘resolved’ and person who launched the complaint will get a notification that his complaint has been resolved. As soon the complaint is launched, the system generates an SMS and send it to the complainant mentioning the complaint number, and the person/department that is going to redress it.
Once a public representative lodged a complaint, the software itself generates a Complaint ID while the complainant also receives a Text Message Intimation. While logging into the dashboard of this software, the complainant can view various options as well as the present status of his/her complaints.
The software also has an administrative dashboard to monitor the launched complaints as well as to track effective resolution is also available to all the high-level government officials ultimately resulting in good governance and improving the overall situation in the city.
Presently, a comprehensive training session is already underway on daily basis at the Town Hall, Lahore by the technical team from PITB, which is training public representatives about how to effectively use this software.
The application also comprises of a back end dashboard that summarises the entire status of the launched complaints, category-wise and region-wise and the time being taken to redress those complaints in a very easy to understand graphical format. This can be used by the higher management to oversee the entire process and make necessary smart decisions based on that data.
The automation of the whole process will not only reduce the time to launch such complaints which are currently being done by physically visiting the department concerned. Now the elected members of the local government can remotely launch complaints 24/7 resulting in overall good governance and improving the civic outlook of the city.
Goshi Butt, a councillor from Gulshan-e-Ravi said he had used Fix-It, the software made by PITB, and it was really amazing. He congratulated Dr Umar Saif and PITB for providing technological advancement in the province and urged all his fellow councillors to start using this software to resolve daily issues in their respective areas.
