Federal Audit Office: Ruthless report on the status of digital administration

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A report by the Federal Audit Office shows the sobering status quo in the digitization of the administration and names the causes of the problems. For example, the auditors found that in July of this year, only 5 percent of the so-called "one-for-all" online services (EfA) were being used "across the board" as planned. "This means that 95 percent of the EfA solutions that have been fully financed by the federal government are mostly only in use in one state or municipality or are even investment ruins," says the unpublished report, which is available to c't. Der Spiegel had previously reported on the topic.

The report also shows that if federal states and municipalities do not make enormous progress in the introduction of online services by mid-2025, EU funding would be forfeited. The federal government could also reclaim funds from the federal states.

Expenditure of 2.3 billion euros

For the report, the Bundesrechnungshof surveyed the federal and state governments on the status of implementation of the Online Access Act (OZG). According to the report, the federal government alone spent around 2.3 billion euros on administrative digitization between 2020 and 2023.

828 million of this went to the federal states, which primarily developed online services according to the "one-for-all principle" (EfA). This means that a federal state builds and operates a service that is then also to be used by other federal states and local authorities. The federal states and local authorities are responsible for the implementation of most administrative services, including many mass procedures such as re-registration, ID card applications or parental allowance.

"One-for-all" principle does not (yet?) apply

According to the report, the federal government financed the development of a total of 306 EfA services. In July 2024, 264 of these were available online in at least one federal state or municipality, but only 14 services (5 percent) were "nationwide". The federal and state governments consider online services to be comprehensive if they are online in at least nine federal states and are available to at least half of the population of these federal states. The "one-for-all" principle therefore does not yet apply, at least not yet.

The Bundesrechnungshof also asked the federal states about the reasons for not adopting the EfA services. Among the reasons given by the state governments were:

• "The federal states and local authorities interested in reusing the EfA solutions were unable to integrate them into their IT systems."
• "An alternative IT solution (e.g. a competing product from the state's own IT service provider) was already in use in the federal states and municipalities."
• "The EfA solutions were not compatible with the specialist procedures (e.g. due to differing data standards)."
• "The federal states or local authorities did not want to use an IT solution because there was too little demand for it in the federal state or local authority."
• "The EfA solutions did not meet the essential technical requirements of the federal state."

Criticism of the Ministry of the Interior

The Bundesrechnungshof accuses the Federal Ministry of the Interior (BMI) of releasing budget funds for EfA services without first ensuring their cost-effectiveness. To do this, the federal states should have assessed in advance whether other federal states and local authorities have a need for the services.

The BMI is defending itself against this accusation: the principle of economic efficiency was taken into account and models were made available to the federal states for testing. If EfA services are not used across the board, it will examine whether federal funds can be reclaimed from the federal states.

If the EfA principle does not take effect soon, the federal government could lose its entitlement to EU funds. It wants to reclaim up to 3 billion euros from the European Union's Recovery and Resilience Facility (ARF). However, only two of the three milestones required for this have been reached so far, according to the Court of Auditors' report. "To achieve the third milestone, at least 100 EfA solutions must be available online across the board by June 2025."

(cwo)