Electronisation of the Public Administration primarily focusing
on the Data boxes*
Damian Czudek
ANNOTATION
With the introduction of the information technologies the development of the society started
to significantly speed up and it is obvious that also the Public Administration in the whole
world has to follow this trend, as well. The term „electronisation“ or „introduction of
electronic devices“ is undoubtedly well-know, anyway the legal attributes of the
electronisation still escape from the attention of legal experts. For that reason the contribution
intends to describe the legal aspects of electronisation in Public and mainly Tax
Administration in the Czech Republic primarily regarding launch of Data boxes.
KEY WORDS
Electronisation; Public Administration; Data boxes; delivering
INTRODUCTION
In the beginnings of this paper it is crucial to explain two main institutes; the first one is the
electronisation of Public Administration, often called “e-government as a result of
electronisation that is still in progress in every area of our lives. The next one is the
“delivering” as a main institute not just in the field of public administration but in all fields.
This does not necessarily mean that the electronisation is so called status quo without any
future progress. Mates and Smejkal mention in their publication, dedicated to e-government,
that this term became a part of newspeak of modern society, so there is no need to find
appropriate equivalent in any language. 1
We could meet the e-government almost everywhere and it could be said that it is not the
expression of something trendy but, more than that, something modern. In easy words he
main idea of e-government is the next step how to approach Public Administration to citizen
and also how to cope with progressive necessity of communication speed and effectiveness
that is one of the prerequisite of so called Good Administration. From this point of view we
could the expression e-government also in the documentation of OECD2
. E-government is
understood as „the use of information and communication technologies, and particularly the
internet, as a tool to achieve better government“.3
The definition of e-government could be also found in materials of World Bank. According to
the formulation of this institution e-government primarily deals with „use by government
agencies of information technologies (such as Wide Area Networks, the Internet, and mobile
computing) that have the ability to transform relations with citizens, businesses, and other
arms of government. These technologies can serve a variety of different ends: better delivery
*
This article is one of the outputs from a project called „Providing Information in Public Administration with the
focus on the Tax Administration and the introduction of electronic devices in Public Administration execution“
1
Mates, P., Smejkal, V., E-government v českém právu. Praha: Linde, 2006, str. 9
2
OECD., IMPLEMENTING E-GOVERNMENT IN OECD COUNTRIES: EXPERIENCES AND CHALLENGES,
[25.5.2011]. See: http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/35/6/36853121.pdf
3
Luterek, M., e-Government. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Akademickie i Profesjonalne. 2010, str.33. – the
original source was not accessible
of government services to citizens, improved interactions with business and industry, citizen
empowerment through access to information, or more efficient government management. The
resulting benefits can be less corruption, increased transparency, greater convenience,
revenue growth, and/or cost reductions“.4
In most simple way e-government could be defined as a synonym for delivering of public
information and public services through the internet.5
Language aspect of the matter proposes the idea that e-government is an abbreviation for
“electronic government” that could be also translated as an electronic administration (eadministration).
In succession to this he Polish expert science highlights certain inaccuracy of
interpretation of this meaning. E-government includes the services proposed by different
organizational budget bodies6
that however go up to the framework of Public Administration
sensu largo. This could be the explanation why e-government should be primarily understood
as an “electronic system of public information and services.” 7
If we discuss the electronisation in Public Administration and data boxes we primarily mean
the new methods of communication between PA bodies, and also the communication
established between PA body and citizens. In this respect it seems to be crucial to point out
another procedural institute, the delivering.
Delivering is one of the key institutes in the field of procedural law impacting, in the very
important way, every part of legal system and ensuring procedural rights of legal proceedings
participants in attachment to implementation of material legal regulation. Delivering does not
mean solely on one separate legal regulation but it includes the collection of legal regulation
influencing the delivering. 8
In the Czech legal literature the delivering is understood as a mean of contact and
communication between PA body and subject participating in proceedings. PA body that
issues the document is also entitled to choose the way of delivering. 9
Anyway this affirmation
should correspond with the key principles of Public Administration proceedings, mainly with
the principle of fastness of delivering and also, hand in hand, with the principle of
proceedings economy to reduce the proceedings costs and also to reduce cost of the subjects
participating on the proceedings. 10
Apart from main procedural codes and other law as
 Act No. 99/1963 Coll, Civil procedural code, as amended
4
Definition of e-Government, World Bank, Washington D.C. [25.5.2011]. See:
http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/TOPICS/EXTINFORMATIONANDCOMMUNICATIONAN
DTECHNOLOGIES/EXTEGOVERNMENT/0,,contentMDK:20507153~menuPK:702592~pagePK:148956~piP
K:216618~theSitePK:702586,00.html
5
Global e-Government Survey, World Markets Research Centre, Brown University, Providence 2001, str. 1
[12.6.2007] See: http://www.respondanet.com/english/financial?mgmt/reports/Globalegovsurvey.pdf
6
Government or local budgets
7
Luterek, M., e-Government. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Akademickie i Profesjonalne. 2010, str. 35-36.
8
Czudek, D., Chalupecká, K., Změny v doručování po 1.7.2009 se zaměřením na správu daní, In: COFOLA
2010: the Conference Proceedings, 1. edition. Brno : Masaryk University, 2010, str. 11
9
Skulová, S. a kol., Správní právo procesní, Plzeň : Vydavatelství a nakladatelství Aleš Čeněk s.r.o., 2008, s.
123.
10
Compare with Henrych, D. a kol., Správní právo, Obecná část, Praha : C.H. Beck, 2006, s. 356; or Skulová, S.
a kol., Správní právo procesní, Plzeň : Vydavatelství a nakladatelství Aleš Čeněk s.r.o., 2008, s. 75.
 Act No. 500/2004 Coll, Administrative code, as amended
 Act No. 150/2002 Coll,. Administrative procedural code, as amended
 Act No. 141/1961 Coll., Penal procedural code, as amended
 Act. No. 280/2009 Coll, Tax Code, as amended,
 Act No. 182/1993 Coll., on Constitutional court, as amended,
this list has been enriched by the special legal regulation, act on electronic acts and authorized
document conversion. 11
In consequence to the Act No. 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document
conversion, as amended (hereinafter as an “Act”), the new accompanying regulation, Act No.
301/2008 Coll., on change of law in consequence to the implementation of law on electronic
and authorized document conversion has been adapted. This law novelizes individual
regulation attached to delivering, mainly the regal regulation mentioned above.12
AIM AND METODOLOGY
The aim of this paper is to analyze the part of electronisation in public administration witch is
new institute in delivering – the data box, what effect all entities dealing with public
administration. The paper describes the current situation in the Czech Republic and evaluates
recent major changes in this field. The purpose is to provide a well-arranged summary of
information available on the analyzed issue.
The theoretical analysis is based on the currently effective legislation in the Czech Republic,
i.e. the Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as
amended (also known as the e-Gov act).
RESULTS
The result of this paper is a comprehensive and coherent overview of knowledge concerning
certain most discussed part of electronisation in public administration and one of the most
important institute in all procedure witch is delivering.
Act on electronic acts and authorized document conversion
As I mentioned above, the Act13
is in conformity with the idea of improving, accelerating and
approaching to the citizen, user of the Public Administration14
The reason report accompanying the Act states the main goal of the new regulation was to:
 Creation of the new communication platform – data boxes
 Authorized document conversion – reciprocal conversion of documents, e.g.
transmission of document from paper form to electronic and vice versa
 Admission that the conversed document possesses the same legal effects as an original
document which brings equalization of electronic and paper form of document
 this would ensure easier, faster, more economic and more effective delivering of
“documents”15
11
Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as amended
12
Czudek. D., Chalupecká K., Změny v doručování po 1.7.2009 se zaměřením na správu daní. In: COFOLA
2010: the Conference Proceedings, 1. edition. Brno : Masaryk University, 2010, str. 15
13
Force of legislation - 1.7.2009
14
Compare with Argument report to Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document
conversion, as amended.
Upcoming part of the article is dedicated to the institute of data boxes and also to the most
important and crucial moments of new legal regulation that should be mentioned.16
Data Box
For the purposes of the communication the Act implements the data boxes17
, which are
defined as an electronic storage designed to the delivering of public authority bodies to
perform the act towards other public authority bodies18
and also, after novelization, to
delivering documents to natural persons, natural persons who are entrepreneurs and, as well,
to legal entities. 19
.
Data boxes, according to the Act, could be distinguished to the data boxes of public authority
body, data boxes of legal entities, data boxes natural persons and data boxes of natural
persons who are entrepreneurs. 20
The functionality of overall data box system is guaranteed by state; the founder and
administrator is the Ministry of interior ČR21
. Nevertheless the data box system keeper is
Czech post, s.p.
In accordance to the § 31 par. 1 Act the Ministry of interior open data box for public authority
bodies, 22
for legal entity23
and also for the attorney, tax consultant and insolvency
administrator 24
within 90 days the Act starts to be effective. The data box is accessible by firs
log in of the person mentioned in § 8 par. 1 – 4 Act. If this subject had not logged in to the
data box, the data box would have been accessible from the 1st
November 2009.
As it is obvious from the explanation mentioned above, for certain subjects the data box use is
mandatory (if it is delivered to these subjects, they are bounded by this delivering, but it is up
to their will if they will also use the data box for sending document, not only receiving25
) and
data boxes were opened to them by law.
Other entrepreneurs and natural persons could also apply for data boxes26
and it depends on
their will if they want to use this way of communication or not. But from the moment when
their data box is once open, the same delivering rules apply, with all positive and negative
consequent aspects, mainly the fiction of delivery.
Main rule for the quantity of data boxes je that one subject is entitled to have strictly one data
box. For legal entities it is obvious that more people could access to the data box with
15
Czudek. D., Chalupecká K., Změny v doručování po 1.7.2009 se zaměřením na správu daní. In: COFOLA
2010: the Conference Proceedings, 1. edition. Brno : Masaryk University, 2010, str. 14
16
Force of legislation - 1.7.2009, but especially according to some technical problems with system security –
Lunch of data boxes moved to 1.11.2009.
17
The data box don’t replace an email, but there are some similarities.
18
§2 Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as amended.
19
§ 2 Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as amended.
20
WWW Ministry of interior ČR [9.7.2010] See : http://www.mvcr.cz/clanek/datove-schranky.aspx.
21
§ 2 par. 2 Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as amended.
22
§ 6 par. 1 Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as amended.
23
§5 par. 1 Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as amended.
24
§ 4 par. 3 Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as amended.
25
§ 18 par. 1 Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as amended.
26
§§ 3 par. 1 a 4 par. 1 Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as
amended.
different right. But this general rule does not apply in case of natural person that is an
entrepreneur in the same time. It that case it is possible to manage two data boxes, one for
private purposes and the second one for business and the public authority bodies should
respect where they are entitled to deliver. Anyway we could find also different opinions, also
according to the decision of Supreme administrative court ČR27
. However his approach denies
the duty of respecting the priority of delivering through data boxes. Also these is missing
regulation of sanctions for public authority bodies – e.g. for invalid or ineffective delivering.
28
According to the § 17 par. 1 Act the public authority bodies are supposed to deliver the
document to the other public authority body through data box in case the type of document
enables this and in case the public authority body does not deliver on the spot. The delivering
on the spot is of course the cheapest and the most effective way of delivering. Also the law
determines the priority of delivering thought the data box in case it is open.
The law also determines in what cases the document sent by the public authority body is
supposed to be delivered. This fiction of delivery comes in the moment when the subject logs
in the data box no matter if he really opens the document. 29
The problem could arise in case
of delivering between two public authority bodies because the law does not contain explicate
regulation. In that the Supreme Court decided, and the author agrees, that in case that the
public authority body is legal proceedings participant and it delivers through data box, the
moment of delivery is equal to the moment when the document is sent not in the moment
when the authorized officer opens the data box. 30
We can generalize that conclusion and say that “it any subject will make a act to the public
authority body, according to the § 18 Act, the moment when the document is sent is equal to
the moment of delivery. 31
From the point of effectiveness of proceedings and preventing from avoiding the delivery the
institute of delivery fiction is designed in two ways. The first fiction arises in case mentioned
above that the authorized person32
logs in the data box. The fiction in this case means that the
delivered message does not need to be open.
In case the authorized subject does not log in within 10 day, the law presumes that it is
delivered by the 10th
day from the day the document has been sent to the data box. 33
However this rule does not apply in case other legal regulation excludes the substitute
delivering. For mitigating the rigidness of law there is a possibility under the conditions in
other legal regulation to demand the declaration of ineffectiveness of delivering.34
This
applies mainly in situation when the subject is objectively unable to log in the data box, e.g.
hospitalization. The burden of evidence lays on the recipient in this case.
27
Judgment of Supreme administrative court ČR nr 1 As 90/2010 - 95
28
Czudek, D., Doručování do datových schránek – 2 roky poté, In: COFOLA 2011: the Conference Proceedings,
1. edition. Brno: Masaryk University, 2011 – dosud nepublikováno
29
§17 par. 3 Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as amended.
30
Decision of Supreme administrative court ČR nr 9 Afs 28/1010,
31
Czudek, D., Doručování do datových schránek – 2 roky poté, In: COFOLA 2011: the Conference Proceedings,
1. edition. Brno: Masaryk University, 2011 – dosud nepublikováno
32
§17 par. 3 Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as amended.
33
§17 par. 4 Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as amended.
34
§17 par. 5 Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as amended.
The law after the novelization also enabled to deliver private documents though data boxes.
From the 1st
January 2010 this applied only on invoices and similar document and effective
from 1st
July 2010 you can use the data box for non limited delivering. The reason of this
process is doubtful probably the most important incentive was the protection of the system
and increased demand on system capacity.
Also it is really important to mention the financial aspect of the system. For the citizens
communicating with the public authority bodies the system is for free, but the price for users
sending the document (the public authority bodies and private individuals sending documents
to other private entity according to the § 18a Act is set as follows 35
:
There is one question that arises and it is the real cost reduction and return of the overall
project. In reasoned report there is mentioned the positive impact on the private sector that
should profit from “acceleration and effectiveness of certain processes in public sector. 36
.
I also agree on the opinion of Koščík that “The mistake of legislator is in calculation that
there is just a cost of delivering though data box that is lower than for standard mail services.
But the legislator obviously ignores the cost of document storage and the document
conversion that finally brings higher costs than the money saved for paper, envelope and
stamp.
The fact that every data box message is deleted within 90 days forces the recipients to store
documents in electronic form that brings permanent costs for storage with uncertainty of time
limited electronic signature, or in paper form after expensive authorized conversion what
could bring really high additional cost, mainly for bigger corporations.37
CONCLUSION
According to my opinion the implementation of data boxes was the progressive step on one
side, but on the other side it is almost necessity in consequence to the electronisation of our
lives. I feel sorry that some steps in legislation are unfinished and certain instruments are
missing for approaching the goals.
35
Smejkal, V., Datové schránky nastupují, In: Právní rádce. 2009, č. 07, str. 11
36
Argument report to Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as
amended. [online]. PSP print nr 445/0, Main part, Part 5. [cit. 25. 5. 2011]. See:
<http://www.psp.cz/sqw/text/tiskt.sqw?O=5&CT=445&CT1=0>.
37
Koščík, M., Datové schránky – Byly naplněny cíle právní regulace? In: COFOLA 2010: the Conference
Proceedings, 1. edition. Brno : Masaryk University, 2010, str. 80
If the legal procedure will be observed, mainly from the public authority bodies, it makes a
possibility to accelerate, simplify and cheapen the legal proceedings and other legal acts. We
could see a little revolution in the fiction of document delivery that determines the fiction of
delivery in case the authorized person does not log in the data box within 10 days after the
document is sent with exception of situations when the substitute delivering is excluded.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
[1] Mates, P., Smejkal, V., E-government v českém právu. Praha: Linde, 2006;
[2] Luterek, M., e-Government. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Akademickie i Profesjonalne.
2010;
[3] Skulová, S. a kol., Správní právo procesní, Plzeň : Vydavatelství a nakladatelství Aleš
Čeněk s.r.o., 2008;
[4] Henrych, D. a kol., Správní právo, Obecná část, Praha : C.H. Beck, 2006;
[5] OECD. IMPLEMENTING E-GOVERNMENT IN OECD COUNTRIES: EXPERIENCES
AND CHALLENGES, [ 25. 5. 2011]. See: http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/35/6/36853121.pdf
[6] World Bank, Washington D.C. [25.5.2011]. See:
http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/TOPICS/EXTINFORMATIONANDCOM
MUNICATIONANDTECHNOLOGIES/EXTEGOVERNMENT/0,,contentMDK:20507153~
menuPK:702592~pagePK:148956~piPK:216618~theSitePK:702586,00.html
[7] Global e-Government Survey, World Markets Research Centre, Brown University,
Providence 2001, str. 1 [12.6.2007] See:
http://www.respondanet.com/english/financial?mgmt/reports/Globalegovsurvey.pdf
[8] Argument report to Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document
conversion, as amended. [online]. PSP print nr 445/0, Main part, Part 5. [25.5.2011]. See:
<http://www.psp.cz/sqw/text/tiskt.sqw?O=5&CT=445&CT1=0>
[9] WWW Ministry of interior ČR [9.7.2010] See : http://www.mvcr.cz/clanek/datove-
schranky.aspx.
[10] Czudek, D., Chalupecká, K., Změny v doručování po 1.7.2009 se zaměřením na správu
daní, In: COFOLA 2010: the Conference Proceedings, 1. edition. Brno : Masaryk University,
2010,
[11] Czudek, D., Doručování do datových schránek – 2 roky poté, In: COFOLA 2011: the
Conference Proceedings, 1. edition. Brno: Masaryk University, 2011 – dosud nepublikováno
[12] Smejkal, V., Datové schránky nastupují, In: Právní rádce. 2009, č. 07,
[13] Koščík, M., Datové schránky – Byly naplněny cíle právní regulace? In: COFOLA 2010:
the Conference Proceedings, 1. edition. Brno : Masaryk University, 2010,
[14] Judgment of Supreme administrative court ČR nr 1 As 90/2010 – 95
[15] Decision of Supreme administrative court ČR nr 9 Afs 28/1010,
[16] Act nr 300/2008 Coll., on electronic acts and authorized document conversion, as
amended.
CONTACT
Damian Czudek
Faculty of Law, Masaryk University
Veveří 70
Brno
damian@czudek.cz
„Electronisation of the Public Administration primarily focusing on the Data boxes“; Konference
New Economic Challenges - 3nd International PhD Students Conference; Ekonomicko - správní
fakulta MU, Brno, červen 2010