Business Service Portal
In 2006, the Austrian federal government launched an initiative aimed at reducing administrative costs for businesses, with a target of saving Austrian businesses over EUR 1 billion by 2012. One significant measure taken as part of this endeavour is the Business Service Portal (Unternehmensserviceportal or USP), whose annual savings potential, depending on the stage reached in its development, is between EUR 100 and 300 million.
The aim of the Business Service Portal is to create optimum conditions for entrepreneurs and thus to provide the best possible support for modern, efficient and digital administrative processes. The intention is to strengthen Austria’s position as a business location and to further expand its pioneering role in e-government.
In the course of the implementation of the Business Service Portal, a central online one-stop-shop is being set up, where businesses will not only be able to request information relevant to them or to their sector, but also will be able to fulfil their information obligations (e.g. notification of an employee’s illness) quickly and efficiently online, securely and at any time of the day or night. This means that a single portal can fully and reliably cover all business needs in terms of transactions with the authorities and the provision of information.
The Business Service Portal already offers information and tips in all areas necessary for businesses in their dealings with authorities. In addition, there is currently a database of forms available and a search function for finding the competent authority to deal with in a particular case.
Alongside this information platform, the most important e-government applications, such as FinanzOnline and the electronic data exchange with Austrian social security institutions (abbreviated to ELDA) are being integrated into the Business Service Portal on a step-by-step basis. Preparations are currently under way for the full operation of the USP from the start of the second quarter of 2012. Stage 2 of the Business Service Portal is also being prepared, the main focus of which will be the optimisation of notification processes and avoiding multiple notifications.
The benefits to businesses are:
- 24-hour access to a secure and up-to-date service;
- all relevant procedures of the federal administration can be seen at a single glance and dealt with in one place; a link between procedures of the federal states and of the local authorities will be technically possible;
- single registration to use all necessary e-government applications;
- customized information matching the profiles of individual businesses is available at the click of a mouse.
The Ministry
