An Analysis of Failure in a Government-to-Government E-Government Context via the Updated Delone and McLean Model - Information and Communication Technologies in Public Administration - page 179

table 8.3 (Continued) the Updated D&M Model and eCReMoS

User
satisfaction

According to their own wordings, some respondents rate
their satisfaction literally “below zero, because of a poor
system quality.” Others find the IS a useful tool to create an
overview or reports for the municipal council. Some claim
usage “has become a habit.” The Flemish government
controls municipalities: Those who do not register enough
data could lose their financial reward. Those who perform
well are never contacted. They, however, would like to know
what the results of their efforts are. User satisfaction has
dropped.

→ Absence of feedback (C2.6) appears to decrease user
satisfaction.

Note: D&M = Delone and McLean; ECREMOS = Environmental Complaints
Registration and Monitoring System; IS = information systems.

◾ C1.8: Mainly small municipalities do not have enough personnel capacity in
terms of time and number to keep the IS up-to-date. Internal quarrels can
hamper use. Several municipalities who did not use the RSD claimed that the
effort to catch up had become too big.
◾ C1.9: When large investments had been made in the past, it was difficult to
take another path. Municipalities are mostly path dependent on a certain
service supplier and his willingness to build applications.

Four additional causes (abbreviated to C2.7-C2.10) seem to further contribute
to the failure of ECREMOS:

◾ C2.7: It became clear during the interviews that the Flemish government

asks to use the IS but does not use it itself. Municipalities deliver data to the
Flemish government. It is very hard to get data in return from the environ-
mental inspection. Lack of transparency decreases trust of local governments.

◾ C2.8: Organizational capacity differs; mainly, small municipalities do not

have enough personnel capacity to keep the data up-to-date. The police does
not always want to use its capacity to communicate to municipalities the
environmental complaints it received.

◾ C2.9: Municipalities are path dependent from investments made in the past.

Some did not want to pay (several times) for developing an xml connection.

◾ C2.10: Local politicians do not see digitized environmental complaints as

important; at the moment, sustainability is the hot topic. Some politicians
demanded that the data were filled in to get the money.