State of Hawaii Saves Money While Improving Citizen Services

Life is good for residents in the State of Hawaii. In addition to living across eight of the most idyllic islands in the Pacific Ocean, the state’s 1.4 million citizens also have a state government focused on providing effective, transparent communications.

For years, state agencies have used Adobe Acrobat Pro DC to transform documents into secure PDF files that improve both internal collaboration and transparency for citizens who want to access documents. The State of Hawaii also decided to base its eSign Services initiatives on Adobe Acrobat Sign, for its ease of use, reliability, and ability to integrate with third-party solutions, including Microsoft SharePoint and Microsoft Outlook. Adoption started with the governor’s office and accelerated from there.

Keeping Hawaii beautiful

Between citizen services and state workforce management, Hawaii once used enormous quantities of paper, totally in the hundreds of thousands each year. However, since launching its eSign Services initiative that uses Acrobat Sign instead of paper-based filings, the state has delivered 400,000 electronic documents, reducing paper usage by roughly 24,000 pages per day.

Agencies and offices across the state embraced the new technology rapidly, as the initiative had a waterfall effect across the government.

“Our eSign Services initiative helped kick off a digital transformation throughout the state government that encourages us to be more agile and responsive so that we can deliver better and more valuable services for our citizens,” says Hawaii Governor David Ige.

The Hawaiian Government can now deliver exceptional and intelligent services faster than ever before. The approval process for documents related to new citizen services now takes a matter of hours rather than two weeks or more. Instead of navigating challenges related to the state’s geography or manually routing documents requiring multiple signatures, forms are sent automatically and people can sign documents on their laptops, tablets, or even mobile phones in seconds.

“By using Hawaii’s eSign Services, state personnel can sign with just a few clicks, so we can focus on state business and roll out new services faster,” says Todd Nacapuy, the State of Hawaii’s Chief Information Officer.

All said, Hawaii has also saved its taxpayers an estimated $5 million over the past two and a half years, giving them even more reasons to be happy with their government.

Enhancing state transparency and accountability

In addition to making the signature process more efficient, since launching Acrobat Sign the state has seen a marked improvement in both the security and traceability of sensitive documents. This is thanks in part to the seamless integration between Acrobat Sign Microsoft Outlook, and Microsoft SharePoint.

“Employees can now use Adobe Acrobat Sign with existing contracts in SharePoint and check status of a document out for signature at any time in Outlook,” says Nacapuy.

Likewise, the new setup has dramatically improved the workflow associated with travel reimbursements. Previously, some personnel wouldn’t even file for reimbursements due to the cumbersome workflow, which included paper documents and three levels of approval signatures.

Now, employees use an integrated workflow that includes Microsoft SharePoint and Acrobat Sign to create, send, and store reimbursement forms in one location. Hawaii is truly showing how digital document and signing services and initiatives can modernize government offices.

To learn more about how Hawaii is using Adobe Document Cloud solutions to improve transparency and save money, as well as how the technology can help you, click here.