Potential of action

Public services are increasingly available digitally and can be accessed online. While this creates a number of opportunities and benefits, what can Citizens reasonably expect from these services and from the public sector offering them? The e-Government Action Plan sets out a number of principles that eGovernment policies in the EU Member States should adhere to in order to provide public services in an open, efficient and inclusive manner, providing borderless, personalised, user friendly end-to-end digital public services to all citizens and business in the EU.

This Charter will provide citizens with a set of principles aimed at clarifying what Citizens may reasonably expect when interacting digitally with the public sector providing digital public services online. This action complements the eGovernment Action Plan and allows for making available a number of principles believed to have general application in all EU Member States when offering and developing digital public services.  Promoted at the EU level the Charter may influence the development of Digital Public Services and provide citizens with a reference document – although not legally binding. 

Description of action

The Charter will be a document co-created with citizens from the EU Member States. As with similar charters provided at the Member State level, this Charter presents guidelines that are non-legally binding. It will have the potential to reach a large audience in the EU Member States. Member States will be encouraged to adopt similar guidelines at the national level. 

Awareness about what citizen may reasonably expect when interacting with the public sector in a digital environment may facilitate the interaction between public administrations and the citizens. Articulating these expectations may also provide EU Member States with a tool that will allow for the provision of improved digital public services towards the citizens. 

Main responsible at the European Commission

DG CNECT H5 Smart Mobility and Living & H4 eGovernment & Trust

Start date: 2017

Target date:

Status: Completed

Since the Commission put forward this action, Member States have taken the idea on board when preparing the Tallinn Declaration and this resulted in the Annex to the Declaration on user-centricity principles. For this reason, the action as envisaged by the Action Plan can be considered completed.

The Commission is now reflecting on how to further support this action under the new European Commission.