Experiencing disappointment with Vietnam Social Insurance app: Digital transformation has not come yet?

VssID application of Vietnam Social Security still has basic disadvantages that make the digital conversion experience of users not favorable.

VssID application can replace health insurance cards, social insurance books Vietnam Social Insurance has actively brought utilities, payment information, benefits to social insurance and health insurance (HI), towards integration, provision of public services, online payment services. application on mobile devices. This is a step in line with the current trend of digital transformation, building a digital government and a digital nation. It is known that Vietnam Social Insurance is an agency for 4 consecutive years, from 2017 to 2020, holding the 2nd position in the application of Information Technology (IT) in Government agencies (According to the ICT Index compiled by the Ministry of Finance). Ministry of Information and Communications annual assessment report). The deployment of VssID – Digital Social Insurance application on the smartphone system is considered one of the key tasks to bring more convenience to people and businesses when they register to use it. VssID application was developed rapidly and has been widely promoted for everyone to install on smartphones. From June 1, 2021, health insurance participants can use photos on VssID for medical examination and treatment. Mr. HHH, an IT expert of a securities company, was one of those who installed the VssID application. “During this transition period, I find it acceptable, the best thing is that my health insurance card is damaged and I don’t have to apply for a new one. I updated the 2 kids in less than 10 minutes to activate. But not everyone has such an easy experience. Mr. D.TT (Hanoi) shared: “Because the application allows to register a phone number without OTP authentication, when I registered, it turned out that my phone number was registered by a person in Ha Tinh. Had to call a few times there to change it back, it took a few days. The call center has run out of words. Called dozens of times, no one picked up the phone. And Ms. D.T (HCMC) said: “It took me nearly a dozen times to register, fortunately I didn’t have to call the switchboard.” “In response to the social insurance campaign, I installed VssID last month. In general, the interface of the VssID app is also quite normal, if not bad,” commented Anh VHA (Hanoi). “I just tried to check on June 1, I found it incredibly boring, far behind the online sales apps. But more importantly, when viewing information, it is extremely slow due to having to download data” – Ms. NTTH (HCMC) shared a screenshot showing that it takes 3 to 5 minutes to log in to the system. But according to those who have tried installing the app, the worst experience is in the customer support. Call center 1900.9068 called dozens of times, no one picked up the phone, emailed no response, and the chatbot was ineffective. Customers when using a product or service that have problems, they will be very disappointed and angry when there is no support. While social insurance provides 3 support channels, none of them work effectively. This is an issue to be aware of in the provision of public services. When looking up information about the insurance premium period, some people find that the application does not fully show their insurance period. “Last month, when I looked up my social insurance payment information, I only looked up the latest 3 months’ social insurance payment information. This month, the VssID app is updated, the information is more complete, showing 19 years of premium payment, but still missing my 4-year period. It can be said that the database of social insurance is problematic, not really synchronized. The IT infrastructure of Vietnam Social Security seems to be still not commensurate with the tasks and responsibilities,” said one user. In addition, the problem that many people wonder about is the possibility of personal data leakage. Mr. MT, an IT expert of IBM commented: “VssID is very convenient to have the name and year of birth to find out the social insurance number and some other information. But if not clever, hackers can steal the entire database.” As a Digital Transformation expert and monitoring the “Vietnam ICT Index Readiness for Application and Development” (Vietnam ICT Index), I realize that besides the commendable efforts, digital transformation of Social Security There are still many problems to fix. In the effort to build e-Government in ministries and branches, one of the important goals is to bring 100% of public services to the online environment, to smart mobile devices. I think, ministries and sectors should pay attention to service quality instead of following 100% quantity. Hopefully, Social Security will quickly overcome the disadvantages of the VssID application as well as carefully review its industry’s Digital Transformation plan to better serve the legitimate needs of the insured.