2011 Brussels Bar annual election: an electronic success

The Brussels Bar elections held last month (June 2011) gained a new momentum thanks to the availability of a new remote electronic voting platform entirely managed and operated by Risc Group Belgium, a subsidiary of STS Group and leading managed services and Cloud Computing provider.

The digital services platform, dedicated to the Brussels Bar (French Speaking Lawyers) and meeting the specific needs of the legal profession, was revamped and customized to facilitate the process for lawyers to vote remotely via the Internet. For the past six years, the services provided by the pla tform have allowed lawyers of the French-speaking Bar of Brussels, to elect their Head and representatives remotely via the Internet (using secure electronic envelopes). When you know that the Brussels Bar alone accounts for 55% of French-speaking lawyers in Belgium, it goes without saying that the issue of these annual elections is important.

Revamped user interface, invitations and reminders to vote via interactive notifications, dedicated hotline and online support service, ... initiatives that suggest that the new e-voting platform operated by Risc Group in Belgium, combined with its Confidence Services offer, powered by STS Group and offering electronic vault and secure e-mail services, should rapidly attract the interest of the legal profession in Belgium.

As part of the technical support services provided during the elections, direct support, managed by Risc Group Belgium, was made available to lawyers of the Brussels Bar. A telephone number and email contact were created for the occasion in order to assist lawyers in their various requests around the voting process and election. Around 70 requests were recorded during the election that took place over a 10 day period. All the requests were processed within 30-minutes, thanks to a specially trained support team who could manage multiple calls simultaneously. The limited number of requests for support, less than 4%, shows that the new portal was intuitive; even though users concerned by this election are traditionally attached to the paper. The support team was also in close contact with the official assessors of the vote, so as to give regular feedback on the development of the electronic voting process but also to connect lawyers with their fellow election assessors with respect to specific requests.

An electronic success

73.5% of participants in the election voted electronically over the Internet (vs. in paper), a ratio which has increased every year since the system was introduced in 2006. "Our legal profession has recognized the usefulness and effectiveness of such electronic solutions that are essential for the right functioning of the Brussels Bar. We are now just a few steps away from crossing a large gap to introduce such digital tools in the daily management of all law firms”, underlined Bernard Magrez, lawyer at the Brussels Bar, member of the head of the Bar’s law firm, President of the Internet-Observatory (Belgium), law teacher at the IIE Valenciennes, SSI Expert recognized by ANSI (France).

And if you look more closely, with Risc Group Belgium’s Confidence Services, coupled with its recent partnership with the Belgian Certification Authority, Certipost, all the required tools (digital evidence, exchange and archiving) are now available for lawyers to adopt and benefit from genuine paperless processes. These solutions are made available and fully operated by Risc Group Belgium in partnership with the Brussels Bar.

For more information please contact Felicity Burton on 01492 862780

Brussels, 15th July 2011