Case Studies
(Government)
San Joaquin County, CA
San Joaquin counts on Image-X’s fine work in making prompt child support a reality for many of our nation's children
Situation/Need: The American public is more aware than ever of the important role child support plays in creating a stable environment for families. Child Support Departments all over the country strive to deliver a professional, efficient and sensitive child support service, which plays a very crucial role in ensuring that children whose parents do not live together are financially supported. Collecting child support creates significant challenges. In addition to the delays caused by parents who refuse to pay child support, agencies are burdened with the long and tedious forms that are required for filing an action to collect payments.
The San Joaquin County Department of Child Support Services (DCSS) helps parents fulfill their responsibilities towards their children by providing a variety of services. The mission of the San Joaquin County Department of Child Support Services is to make a difference in the lives of children by providing high quality, dedicated child support services. Every year, huge amount of hild support cases are filed in the county. Filing a lawsuit proved to be tedious and time-consuming. Often the paper traffic created by one case alone was too complicated to manage; there were long forms to fill out, documents to copy, and stacks of paper to collate and deliver to the court.
Image-X Solution: Image-X’s successful implementation of child support system for Riverside County has been the chosen blueprint for San Joaquin County. Image-X understood the legal processes and the complexities of traditionally intense paper driven processes. Child support cases must be processed within the time frame specified by law, failing which custodial parents could loose the opportunity to receive child support. Consequently, courts face constant ressure to shorten processing time as much as possible. To accelerate the transmission of cases, we proposed a system that would provide storage & retrieval of case files, ensuring long-term document accessibility & preservation, protection from unauthorized access & alteration, rapid staff acceptance, & smooth integration with existing applications.
Our system helped San Joaquin County to track the complete case flow right from filing the case till serving the case to the defendant. The system involves components like Spool File Parser and Electronic Document Acceptance and Routing System (EDAR) application. Image-X utilizes its proprietary XML forms product (XForms) to enable DCSS to move data from their mainframe system to XForms, which fills forms online, allowing DCSS to review and submit the completed forms online. Once the case is submitted, the data files are parsed using spool file application. The system extracts case related information and enters it into the database. This database is the input to the web application. The cases that are parsed and saved in the database can be viewed through web application. The web application can be used for searching, viewing and submitting the case. Only the accepted cases are forwarded to the process server for serving. The process server updates the case status on the basis of Served cases, Bad address and Unable to serve. If the cases are served by the process server, the process server fills a Proof of service (POS) form. The served cases along with POS are sent to the court for approval or rejection. The cases that are marked as Bad address and/or Unable to serve are sent back to the administrator.
Using our EDAR (Electronic Document Acceptance and Routing) software, the County courthouse is able to review the document for completeness and accuracy. If the form is incorrect, the County is able to annotate on the form or reject and return the submittal for clarifications or further work. Once satisfied with the submittal, the County courthouse accepts the document and takes the data into their line-of-business application. EDAR allows interactive communication between the filer and the receiver through the electronic window. The system’s global correction feature enhances the ability to make individual corrections replicate throughout all of the forms and thereby save the filer time and improve accuracy.
Result: A lack of automated tracking system meant that San Joaquin County clerks and file runners required 6-8 hours to fulfill requests for child support case files, which ultimately resulted in the delay of support reaching the children who needed it the most. Integrating our solution helped them eliminate backlogs in the child support collection process. It enabled caseworkers to access and keep track of information simply and efficiently without wasting their time - or their cool.
Image-X aided San Joaquin County to better serve its young children by reforming the quality and efficiency of their indigenous system.
