Land Information New Zealand

Land Information New Zealand

Context

Land Information New Zealand (LINZ) is responsible for providing New Zealand's authoritative land and seabed information. The Internet is used to provide information, deliver services, and provide base geospatial data for other service providers to help provide integrated services.

LINZ provides information and transactional services primarily for businesses and other government agencies. A considerable amount of LINZ's geospatial information is also available on the Internet for the public.

Land Information New Zealand E-government Initiatives

• Position NZ
• Hydrographical Infrastructure project
• Long Term Strategy for Topographic Information Online
• Geospatial Information Strategy (all of government initiative)

Summary

Ready Access: LINZ's website and metadata are of a high standard, providing people with ready access to information and services. LINZ's key e-service, Landonline, enables secure electronic title and survey transactions.

Alignment: LINZ's alignment with the E-government Strategy is good. LINZ intends to extensively use the Internet in all areas of its business. The LINZ Statement of Intent has a strategic goal for e-delivery excellence.

Internet and Communications Technology

LINZ uses the Internet extensively to manage information and provide integrated, transactional services. The Landonline website is one of LINZ's key projects that uses the Internet for access. Landonline replaces the land title and survey system by enabling online completion of the processes required by land surveyors, conveyancers, local government and other businesses involved with property boundaries and land ownership.

Uptake of the three core Landonline services has been encouraging during 2004. Over 98% of all title searches are now done electronically via the Landonline service e-search.

By August 2004, approximately a third of the survey firms have e-survey licences, with digital survey lodgements meeting targets and continuing to increase. Feedback from users is very positive, which is a reflection of both the service's functionality, and the cost and timeliness benefits for surveyors' businesses.

Landonline e-dealing adoption is on the increase, with over 20% of Solicitors and Search and Lodgement Agent firms having an e-dealing licence. Though slow at first, usage of e-dealing is now gaining momentum. Research has indicated that slower than expected uptake of e-dealing is primarily a refection of individual attitudes to technology and changes in conveyancing processes. However, the benefits of e-dealing, such as the opportunities for efficiency gains for lawyers and conveyancers, are now beginning to be acknowledged by this community.

To ensure uptake of e-services LINZ pursed a multi-headed strategy. This included ensuring application availability and stability, as well as the implementation of a customer-focused strategy encompassing improved customer information and its dissemination though the Internet and other media, an improved sign-up experience on the website, a tailored training strategy, and effective customer support through telephone and email assistance.

LINZ has converted over 7 million physical records into digital records that are now held in Landonline. Landonline has also enabled LINZ to streamline its business functions, resulting in faster processing of both manual and electronic survey and title lodgements, and registration.

LINZ uses electronic channels for other services, and there are several initiatives underway to identify strategies for improving use of the electronic channel as a delivery mechanism. Electronic channels will improve access to more timely and accurate information. For example, the Hydrographical Infrastructure Project is identifying the infrastructure required to support the capture, storage, maintenance and dissemination of hydrographic products and services undertaken by LINZ on behalf of the Crown.

Some projects have implications for third party businesses that on-sell LINZ information. Third party providers are bypassed when LINZ information is provided using electronic means, such as online maps and charts. Consequently, LINZ recognises the need to consider the wider implications of electronic processing if the quality of information and services provided may be compromised, such as third party after sales service.

The 2004/05 Statement of Intent identifies a number of agency wide initiatives for the next five years. These include:

• reducing the number of separate databases
• better descriptions of LINZ data and its characteristics, and more integrated access to the data
• greater sharing of LINZ data with other government agencies via the Internet.

Internally, a number of projects have recently been completed or are underway to improve internal information access and management. For example, LINZ completed an Internet-based online induction package last year. LINZ continues to make structural improvement to its intranet and an electronic document management system will be introduced soon.

Ready Access to Information and Services

Metadata

LINZ has 85 metadata records, including 58 documents, 26 services, and an agency record. LINZ's metadata is of a very high standard. Information is up to date and no broken links were found.

Although some language used in titles and descriptions may be difficult for some members of the public to understand, LINZ has a specialised audience for some of its information and specialised language is unavoidable in many situations.

A few of LINZ's offline services could be made online in future.

Website Assessment

Websites assessed during May 2004 included:

www.linz.govt.nz

but excluded Landonline.

Overall, the LINZ website is of a high standard.

The strengths of the LINZ site are information delivery and required government content. There is room for improvement in the areas of accessibility and e-services delivery.

LINZ's highly sophisticated e-service, Landonline, was not assessed. Landonline survey and title lodgement and registration functions can only be accessed by authenticated, registered users, ensuring that the integrity of the titles register and digital cadastre is maintained at all times.

Key quality issues noted during the assessment included:

• Very good range, depth and presentation of information and services content.
• Some usability issues could be addressed to make the site easier to use.
• Some required email addresses were not answered during the assessment.
• Missing accessibility features, such as navigation skipping and style sheet problems may impede some physically impaired people's access.
• Some text documents are in PDF only, excluding those people who are unable or unwilling to read these formats.
• Contact details could be more specific to enable responsive handling of enquiries.

Alignment With E-government Goals

Convenience and Satisfaction

LINZ's website provides comprehensive information, including a number of online, transactional services. People can also contact call centre staff through a single-point-of-contact call centre. Call centre staff often help guide clients through the online services provided and assist businesses complete online transactions.

Landonline has enabled online transactions for a significant proportion of LINZ's services. LINZ intends to continue to extend the use of the Internet to deliver more of their services.

Integration and Efficiency

Information is highly integrated. LINZ information is integral to the delivery of information and services provided by other agencies. Many government agencies, such as Crown Research Institutes, the Police, the New Zealand Defence Force, local government and private businesses, access and share LINZ geospatial information.

LINZ is committed to cross-agency services. A Statement of Intent goal for the agency is 'All-of-Government Leadership',extending LINZ's expertise in land information to achieving cross-government outcomes.

Participation

Stakeholder participation in the design and implementation of online services, such as Landonline, is actively encouraged. For example, Law Society and Institute of Surveyors members were involved in the design of Landonline to help ensure that the system closely matched their requirements. A further advantage of encouraging participation is that people are more likely to use a system they helped design, and encourage others to use it too.

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