Context
To help private households cope with the increased housing and heating costs, the Austrian Federal Government provided a one-time grant of €450 million in 2023 in accordance with the Housing and Heating Cost Subsidy Act. The funds devoted to the region of Upper Austria were paid out by the Department of Social Affairs as part of the Upper Austrian state administration. Specifically, in this region around 45 per cent of all households were eligible to apply and a particular focus was put on the target group of families with children, who could receive an increased grant.
With an expected number of 290 000 applications, the verification and payment of the bonus had to be carried out unbureaucratically and quickly. Manual verification, which had been common practice in the Upper Austrian state administration up to that point, was not feasible due to constraints in human and time resources. Nevertheless, a verification of the eligibility requirements could not be omitted.
Objectives
To address this issue, an interdisciplinary project team of special consultants and IT specialists of the Upper Austrian State Government was formed to develop a specialised software ‘Oberösterreichischer Wohn- und Energiekostenbonus’ (Upper Austrian housing and energy cost bonus). The aim of this software was to process all applications in a more efficient way, so that households could receive this financial assistance without delay. In addition, the Department of Social Affairs also sought to save resources through the application of technology. It was calculated that the software saved up to 200 staff units compared to manual processing, resulting in cost savings of around €800 000 per month.
Implementation
This new software was developed in four months, making it possible to complete the task of verifying applications in good time. Using the data from the Austrian Transparency Database and the Central Population Register, all verification steps could be carried out fully automatically, based on a mature decision matrix. Thanks to this specialised software, more than 150 000 households were able to benefit from the grant, with most applications being fully processed within a week of submission.
To ensure the smooth running of the software, attention was paid to stakeholder involvement. Regular feedback meetings were held with selected municipalities to discuss the progress of the software development and to gather suggestions for the local processing. When applying for the bonus, citizens submitted their applications via an online form, and for questions and assistance they could contact either the specially set up hotline or the citizen services of the municipalities and cities. This ensured access to the service for people without internet access or digital skills.