Vietnam Social Insurance: Efforts on digitalization ensure social security benefits

	Reducing administrative documents in social insurance and health insurance sector
	Deputy General Director of Vietnam Social Insurance Tran Dinh Lieu: Participating in voluntary social insurance will gradually become a habit and cult

Centre on people

According to Vietnam Social Security, by the end of December 2021, the number of procedures, papers, forms, documents and implementation time has been reduced and electronic transactions pomoted (people and enterprises can interact and transact with the social insurance agency 24/7).

A set of administrative procedures continues to fall from 27 procedures to 25; 100% of administrative procedures offered online at level 4; procedures for handling policies to support employees and employers (especially when implementing Resolution No. 68/NQ-CP, 116/NQ-CP of the Government, Decision No.: 23/2021 /QD-TTg, 28/QD-TTg of the Prime Minister) is shortened from five days to only one working day; through electronic transactions and promptly provide eight more public services to organize the implementation of policies to support employees and employers.

In particular, now enterprises only need to use an electronic means with an internet connection to make an online declaration of “Submission of Social Insurance”.

With the application of IT, the implementation of electronic transactions will help enterprises have more options to declare and pay social insurance, reduce making declarations through the support of IVAN providers, and reduce the waiting time of the enterprise.

At the same time, since 2021, Vietnam Social Security has developed the Master Plan on Digital Transformation of the industry; promulgated the Plan on IT application to develop the Digital Government and ensure network information security in the operation of the Vietnam Social Insurance Industry in the 2021-2025 period; build software, connect all professional fields of the industry; build and complete the 4.0 ecosystem to serve people and enterprises with basic services: SMS service; online payment service; Chatbot system to support customers (whereby people and enterprises can interact and transact with the social insurance agency 24/7).

The digital transformation has been paid special attention, which helps to improve the efficiency of many aspects of activities of Vietnam Social Security. The combination of inspection, examination and supervision by traditional methods with inspection, examination and supervision by electronic means helps to increase efficiency, quality, reduce human resources, reduce the number of inspections and examinations, but more violations were detected and handled.

Since 2017, the Vietnam Social Insurance industry has reduced health insurance spending by more than VND9,359 billion.

Efforts to implement digital transformation

Assessing the results of IT application and digital transformation of Vietnam's social insurance industry, Mr. Nguyen Hoang Phuong, Deputy Director of the Center for IT (Vietnam Social Insurance), said that currently, Vietnam Social Insurance had nearly 30 application systems; managing a database of nearly 98 million people, corresponding to nearly 28 million households nationwide; with more than 20,000 accounts of civil servants, public employees and employees in the industry which regularly accesses, exploits and uses to perform operations; connecting with more than 12,000 medical examination and treatment facilities and more than 500,000 organizations and enterprises using public services nationwide, ministries and branches.

Every year, the e-transaction portal receives and processes nearly 100 million applications. In 2021 alone, from the beginning of the year until now, the number of online-resolved applications was nearly 70 million. Thus, on average, each social insurance officer would have to process more than 4,000 cases per year.

According to Mr. Phuong, the workload and pressure of the industry was very large, especially as the Covid-19 pandemic was very complicated in many localities in 2021, if not promoting IT application, digital transformation, they would have not met the assigned task.

However, with the attention and drastic direction of the leaders of Vietnam Social Security, the digital transformation of the industry had made rapid progress.

Currently, Vietnam Social Security is implementing digital transformation through continuous improvement of technical infrastructure; building and completing the database and identification codes, especially the National Insurance Database according to the Government's Decree No. 43/2021/ND-CP dated March 31, 2021; building basic service layers (identification, interaction, customer care; risk management, safety and security) and building software to serve participants of social insurance and health insurance.

The most successful application of Vietnam Social Security was VssID-BHXH number on smartphones with five languages ​​(Vietnamese, English, French, Korean, Italian). Less than a year after the announcement of the application, there had been nearly 30 million personal electronic transaction accounts (used to log in, use the VssID application) registered and approved.

According to General Director of Vietnam Social Insurance Nguyen The Manh, Vietnam Social Security was one of the leading agencies in IT application. Timely and effectively deploying online public services, electronic payments, electronic transactions, connecting and solving administrative procedures on the national data axis, deploying the application of VssID-digital Social Insurance.

The electronic database system of Vietnam Social Security has effectively supported pandemic prevention and control activities. Vietnam Social Security was honoured to receive the ASSA President's Effective Practice Award for the 2020 – 2021 term in the "Information Technology" category for the VssID-BHXH digital application on smartphones within the framework of the meeting of the Executive Committee of 38th ASEAN Social Security Association (ASSA).

According to Mr. Nguyen The Manh, in the future, Vietnam Social Security would focus on promoting digital transformation, make the most of the foundation and resources of staff, facilities, and IT in management activities and professional services of Vietnam's social insurance industry to serve enterprises and people.

At the same time, further innovate the content, form and method of communication to ensure practicality, efficiency, diversity and flexibility in accordance with the characteristics of each region and psychology of each population group; focus on promoting the advantages of modern and multimedia forms and methods of communication online and social networks; ensure that people have the best access to all information on social insurance and health insurance policies.