Hanoi climbed up 19 ranks in the 2020 Satisfaction Index of Public Administration Services (SIPAS) with a score going from 80% in 2019 to 85% a year later, demonstrating the city’s strong efforts in administrative reform.

Local looking at guidance in realizing administrative procedures at Gia Lam District People's Committee. Photo: The Hanoi Times

The municipal Department of Internal Affairs published a report on Hanoi’s performance in administrative reform in 2020.

The SIPAS, conducted by the Ministry of Home Affairs since 2017, assesses the performance of public services in 16 fields in 63 provinces/cities from citizen’s perspective, with the service quality based on five criteria of “access to service”, “administrative procedures”, “civil servants”, “service outcome” and “compliant settlement”.

With such a score, Hanoi is now ranked 33rd out of 63 provinces/cities, a significant improvement from 52nd in 2019. This is also the city’s highest score since the first SIPAS edition in 2017 and the third consecutive year with a score of over 80%.

Among the five central-level cities, Hanoi is the second-highest scoring city only after Haiphong in second place out of 63 provinces/cities (scoring 93.57%), and above Cantho (38/63 or 84%), Ho Chi Minh City (43/63 or 84%), and Danang (47/63 or 83%).

The Hanoi’s Department of Internal Affairs noted the city’s 2020 SIPAS result has significantly narrowed its gap with the national average score by 4.36% (average of 84%) in 2019 to 0.33% (average of 85%) in 2020.

Taking a more detailed look at Hanoi’s performance, this is also the first year that the city gaining over 80% in all five criteria of SIPAS, scoring the highest in administrative procedures with 89%, followed by service outcome, access to service, civil servants, and compliant settlement.

The area of complaint settlement was the most improved score compared to 2019 with an increase of 8.4% to touch 81%.

The department, however, noted the gap between the top and Hanoi remains high by a difference of 10.01%, while the improvement of “access to service” has not up to expectation by a modest of 1.71%.

Regarding the expectation from the citizen and organizations, the SIPAS pointed out 56% of 2,520 respondents in Hanoi look for more simplification of administrative procedures, 44% expect shorter processing time, 42% for returning of service results via post, and 41% call for greater promotion of online public services at advanced stages of 3 and 4.

“To gain the public satisfaction would require drastic measures from state agencies in addressing their shortcomings in the coming time,” stated the Department.