Challenges of Outsourcing in e-Government Services in a Federal Agency in Malaysia: A Case Study

Government agencies in Malaysia rely heavily on computers as tools or enablers for effective and efficient public service delivery. In tandem with the increase in computer usage, Malaysia's 2012 Budget tabled a significantly surge in ICT expenses. Doubtlessly, online public services are crucial to a country's socio-economic development as this offsets other important criteria to catapult the country's growth and wellbeing toward Vision 2020. As a consequence, each government agency has formalized their annual ICT allocations including outsourcing services and state-of-the art peripherals that they are unable to cater to. Thus, this study is significant in providing the empirical evidence for ICT usage by assessing the feasibility of outsourcing an agency's e-government services. Also, the findings from the qualitative inquiries and analyses would provide the evidence in outsourcing, particularly for e-government services. This is to ensure that the e-service delivery is as effective and efficient as other non-outsourced online services. Therefore, the agency chosen for this case study research project is the Malaysia Department of Insolvency (MdI). In MdI's quest to be at par excellence with other federal agencies, ensuring the accuracy, relevancy and timeliness of the department's core responsibilities are of top priority. Of particular contemporary interest are issues on bankruptcy where there have been calls to review the Bankruptcy Act 1967 in order to allow bankrupts to apply to be discharged from bankruptcy after three years. By putting the bankruptcy clearance processes online, this will reduce the red tape and hence, increase efficiency.