Commissioned by the federal government, the survey quizzed 1 004 firms in January of this year. In every sector except agriculture, it found a growing trend towards on-line contact with the authorities. Companies with 250 employees or more have increased their eGovernment take-up particularly fast since 2006. But smaller firms with nine employees or less are catching up: 44 % of them now favour the on-line processing of their administrative contacts with the authorities – a 9 % increase over last year’s figure.
As well as sectoral information, companies tend to go for the authorities’ on-line provision of accident insurance, legislative texts, administrative directories and business news. Swiss firms’ wish-list for eGovernment includes the expansion of the national administrative directory and more on-line guidance about social insurance, as well as a simplification of value-added tax.
The Swiss cantons’ websites are now better known in business circles. Of those surveyed, 24 % mentioned them (up 7 % on last year), and 15 % were aware of municipal sites (also up 7 %); 34 % said they use the cantons’ on-line services (up 20 %) and 2 1% use those of the boroughs (up 13 %); 74 % rated the cantonal services as very or fairly good (up 4 %); while 65 % said the same about the municipal services (up 3 %). The approval rating for federal eGovernment services also rose to 61 % (up 2%). However, 31 % of those interviewed could not comment on the federal services as they were unaware of them. The health, construction and manufacturing sectors gave eGovernment the highest scores.
