The document discusses the Norwegian Immigration Administration's (UDI) efforts to digitalize its business and legislative rules. It aims to increase efficiency by automating routine processes and decisions using a Business Rules Management System (BRMS). The BRMS allows non-technical staff to manage rules and supports increasing levels of automation over time. Examples show how the BRMS facilitates automated information exchange with other agencies and increases the number of cases handled through its decision module. The goal is to standardize equivalent cases while retaining human review of complex cases and ensuring policymakers can easily update the system with new rules.

2. Digitalizing Business and
Legislative Rules in the
Norwegian Immigration
Administration
14.10.2014,
Tobias Vigmostad, Decisive
2

3. Tobias
Vigmostad
Previous
The Norwegian
Directorate of Immigration
14.10.2014 3

4. Talking points
• Norwegian Immigration Administration (UDI)
• Digitalizing rules
• Previous experiences with extensive rule changes
• Increasing the efficiency of the casework in
immigration administration
• Automation strategy
• Digital structure—decisions and rules
• Current use
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5. Norwegian Immigration Administration
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6. Norwegian Directorate of Immigration (UDI)
• Mission
– facilitating lawful and wanted immigration
– ensuring that those who meet the requirements are given
an opportunity to come to Norway
– control function, preventing abuse of the system
• Number of users
– approx. 1200 simultaneous users
– approx. 3000 unique users
• Number of cases
– approx. 350,000 cases going through the system per year
– approx. 200,000 cases routed through the BRMS based
decision module per year
– approx. 100,000 cases handled at UDI

7. UDI in 2008
• Wants
– more efficient work flow
– move towards automated processes and decisions
– easily exchange information with other government
agencies and key partners
• Startup of the EFFEKT-program ($90M)
• Shared solutions for all of the Immigration
Administration
14.10.2014 7

8. What do we mean by digitalization of legal (and
business) rules?
• Has become a collective term
– Digital and Internet codification vs. automation
– Making laws available
• Technology creates new opportunities (and challenges)
– Internet codification of analog law books
– What rules apply to my case
– Help doing legal consideration
– Automate rules
• New technology vs. traditional legal craftsmanship
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9. Calculator laws and rules
Give some input and get an answer
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10. What happened to the considerations?
• In the public sector, the consideration is just as important as
getting the right result
• Considerations are first-class citizens of the domain
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11. What we hoped to achieve
• Business and legal should be able to manage their own
rules
– No special IT-knowledge or skills needed
• Automatic rule checks where it was
– wanted
– prudent
• Retain execution of police power inside the government
body
– Not outsource to outside IT-service providers
• Similar cases should have similar considerations and
results
– Prevent unjust differences in outcome
14.10.2014 11

12. § 40 Requirements residence permit for
spouses
• An applicant who is the spouse of a sponsor, see section 39, shall be entitled to a residence permit where the
sponsor is:
• (a) a Norwegian or Nordic national who is resident or intends to establish residence in the realm,
• (b) a foreign national with a permanent residence permit,
• (c) a foreign national who has or will be granted lawful residence in the realm with a residence permit that
can provide the basis for a permanent residence permit, or
• (d) a foreign national who holds a residence permit pursuant to the provision of section 34 without the
system of collective protection having ended.
• It is a condition for being granted a residence permit pursuant to the first paragraph that both parties are aged 18
or over. It is further a condition that a sponsor who falls within the scope of section 40 a fulfils the conditions set
in that section.
• Unless particular circumstances indicate otherwise, it is a condition that the spouses shall live together.
• A residence permit may be refused if it appears most likely that the main purpose of contracting the marriage
has been to establish a basis for residence in the realm for the applicant.
• An applicant who does not have children from his or her relationship with the sponsor and has not lived together
with the sponsor in an established relationship in another country or in Norway may be refused a residence
permit if it is most likely that the applicant or his or her children from a previous relationship will be mistreated or
grossly abused. The same applies to children from a previous relationship who apply for family reunification with
a parent who has been granted a residence permit without having had children with the sponsor or having lived
together in an established relationship with the sponsor in another country or in Norway. The King may by
regulations make further provisions in respect of the application of this provision.
• If the sponsor is granted residence in the realm after having contracted a marriage with two or more persons,
only one of the persons whom he or she married may be granted a residence permit. If the sponsor is already
married to a person who is resident in the realm, no residence permit may be granted pursuant to this section. If
the sponsor has previously been married to another person, and it appears most likely that the former spouses
intend to continue their cohabitation, a residence permit may be refused.
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13. Brief description of needs and solutions where
BRMS is a key component
Needs Solutions
Classification of cases eDiff (Find similar cases and
patterns in the portfolio)
Simple cases should be easy to
handle
Simple renewals
Automate considerations,
decisions, and decision texts
New BRMS-supported
Decision module with its own
management module for rules
and decision texts
Automatically exchange
information with other
government bodies
eExchange
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14. The system must support the development of
new rules and business ideas
- not hinder them.
Lunch by Børge Lund
TELL ME – WHY
DON’ T WE SELL
THIS PRODUCT
WHEN WE KNOW
THIS IS WHAT
EVERYBODY
WANTS?
BECAUSE IT’S
SO CHEAP THAT
IT DOESN’T PAY
TO PUT IT INTO
THE SYSTEM .
CAN’ ‘ T WE JUST
INCREASE THE
PRICE ?
SORRY. SUCH A
CHANGE HAS TO BE
APPROVED AT SO MANY
LEVELS THAT THE
PROFIT DISAPPEARS .
URGH !
IS IT THE
SYSTEM OR US
WHO ARE IN
CHARGE ?
NO IDEA!
SHALL I CHECK
WITH THE ONES
WHO MADE
• Must be easy to update the system with new rules
• UDI wants «Yes can do» systems, not «No can do» systems
• Rules of tomorrow are just as important as rules of today
IT?
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15. Some areas are easier to automate than others
Rule complexity
Minor Major
Fact
complexity
Minor Bank Pension,
Taxes
Major Criminal cases Immigration,
Building code
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16. Is everything equally complicated?
Rule complexity
• Can we do the simple stuff easier?
Minor Major
Fact
complexity
Minor Simple
renewals
Major Temporary
right to work
Refugee cases
from Somalia
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17. Supercomputer
Seven minutes per case
FURIOUS: Union representatives in the police are
raging over new rules from the government. The
machines are taking over for humans in a new
solution that will decide on immigrants’ fates in
Norway in seven minutes.
Union representatives are furious with the Ministry of
Justice’s latest idea: starting March 1 this year, a new
project will make the case working more efficient and
give immigrants who are applying to extend their stay in
Norway a quicker answer.
Computers are now taking over for the human case
workers, following the so-called “Lean-method,” an
efficiency theory originally invented for the mass
production of cars.
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18. UDI’s approach to automation
- complex rules and facts
Decision
support
Standardizing
Automation
• Gradually and continually increase automation levels
• Certainty within the organization that the automated decisions are correct
• Increase automation without new projects and investment needs
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19. Where do the best ideas come from?
Evaluate
established
practice
Idea
Approve new
practice/rules
Harvest the
rewards
Implement
new rules into
the system
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20. Structuring rules and decisions – meta model
Add rules to
• Evaluate terms and
considerations
• Suggest result
• Internal dynamics for
considerations
• Check for consistency
• etc
Legal source
Rights and obligasjons
Permission/Outcome
Terms and
considerations
Individual decision
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21. Some gains we envisioned
• Business people can manage their own rules
• Execution of police power is wholly within the grasp of
the government—not out-sourced to IT service
providers
• Equivalent cases should be handled in the same way
• Make the brightest, most experienced caseworkers’
know how available to everyone without delay
• Short time to market; enable the business to quickly
gain experience with new rules in the system
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22. How does this work today?
• Rules update once a week
– Demanding but the correct approach
– Can do more if needed
• Big demand from the business people to get new rules
into the system
• IT is no longer a stopper in the system
• The business people update the rules in the system
themselves
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23. Cases going through the new Decision Module
23
10,000
9,000
8,000
7,000
6,000
5,000
4,000
3,000
2,000
1,000
-
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
Series2
Series1

24. Right to stay service e-exchange
24
• UDI’s offered services based on BRMS
 Red IRS
 Blue Government Student Loans
2 500
2 000
1 500
1 000
500
-
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17
Series2
Series1

25. UDI collecting information from IRS
7 000
6 000
5 000
4 000
3 000
2 000
1 000
-
LTO
Likningsopplysninger
25
 Red Collecting monthly pay-stub information
 Blue Last year’s tax information

26. UDI collecting numbers from Norwegian Labor
and Welfare Administration (NAV)
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0
Aa-registeret - NAV
Ytelser - NAV
26  Red Collecting employment information
 Blue Collection benefit (welfare) information

27. UDI says the potential is even bigger…
• These are just some examples
• They are continually working on
– Improvements
– Increased usage
• Full effect scheduled 2017
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28. www.decisive.no
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