SOURCEBOOK SUMMARY | CHAPTER 4: INTAKE, REGISTRATION AND ASSESSMENT OF NEEDS AND CONDITIONS MAY 2022 CHAPTER 4 Intake, Registration, and Assessment of Needs and Conditions Intake and registration and assessment of needs and conditions are the second and third phases of the delivery chain, and their objectives are that the intended populations are registered efficiently, their information is recorded accurately, and they are accurately profiled. The focus of these two phases is on people: individuals, families, or households. They may belong to various intended populations (categories of demographic groups, groups defined according to their socioeconomic status, people with disabilities, people with a particular labor status, vulnerable individuals classified by social risks, or a combination of these categories). At this stage of the delivery chain, we refer to people as applicants or registrants (not beneficiaries) since they have not been deemed eligible for any programs. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 RECURRING 8 9 CYCLE Intake & 2 3 Assessment of Registration Needs and THE DELIVERY CHAIN Conditions INTAKE AND REGISTRATION Intake is the process of initiating contact, engaging clients, and gathering information, while registration consists of recording and verifying that information. Intake and registration are usually simultaneous. Following outreach efforts, the inputs to intake and registration involve people (individuals, families, or households) who apply for assistance, engage with an agency, and provide information and documentation. The primary output from intake and registration is complete information on the applicant that is verified and validated for use as an input to the assessment of needs and conditions. Intake and registration require structures and processes for interfacing with people, who are the “first mile” rather than the “last mile.” The client interface is the point of contact for registrants and applicants. Modalities for intake and registration should have clear points of contact, ideally with multiple channels such as (1) local office, service window, or kiosk; (2) via mobile teams; (3) via social workers, frontline staff or enumerators; and (4) via digital service windows. Intake Modality: On-Demand Intake With on-demand approaches, people proactively apply for one or more benefits and services. The impetus for that application comes from the specific clients, though it may also be stimulated by outreach efforts and/or referrals from other programs or professionals. The timing of their application is largely dictated by their own circumstances. For example, an individual may reach a certain age (such as 65) or a family may have a child or suffer chronic poverty. Intake can take place at the household or at a government office, it can rely on paper or digital forms (both offline and online), and the process can be carried out by the administrator (such as a social worker or caseworker) or it can be a self-service process. In practice, most countries use a combination of these modalities. For example, the process can start with the client visiting a government office followed by a household visit by a social worker, or an online application done at the applicant’s home followed by a visit to a government office for an interview or to submit additional documents or information. Intake Modality: Administrator-Driven Intake Intake for administrator-driven approaches is primarily carried out at the household, usually via door-to-door registration campaigns. En masse registration drives, also known as census sweeps, are often used in areas with a high concentration of the intended population, or in countries with limited data or administrative capacity. Field teams typically go door to door with registration questionnaires for all or most families in a specific region. In some countries, communities prioritize which households are interviewed and registered. When en masse registration approaches are used at a national level, a large share of the population may be registered. Registration Modalities While the specifics vary, registration processes typically include recording applicants’ information, collecting additional data on them, applying quality controls to the data, and consolidating and storing the revised data set. After information gathered from an applicant during intake is recorded, agencies may collect additional information from other administrative systems. 2 | SOURCEBOOK SUMMARY | CHAPTER 4: INTAKE, REGISTRATION AND ASSESSMENT OF NEEDS AND CONDITIONS MAY 2022 Technology and information systems capabilities typically determine to what extent registration will be automated. Until recent decades, registration was paper-to-paper: it was recorded on paper by the intake officer or enumerator, who then relied on paper-based files. With the expansion of technology, some social welfare offices and public employment offices started managing information with spreadsheets and digitized records. Today, many countries still use paper-based registration or application forms to collect data during the intake process, and then enter that data into computers. Others use portable devices to record information digitally (online or offline) during intake and registration, and then transmit the information to an information system. The process is similar for online applicants. INFORMATION TO BE GATHERED DURING INTAKE AND REGISTRATION The content of the information gathered during intake and registration will vary significantly depending on the characteristics of the intended population and the nature of the program(s) that will use the information. A key concept related to information content is the definition of the “assistance unit,” which may be the individual, the family, or the household. Even when the application is for an individual, however, in some instances, information may also be needed for a designated guardian or caregiver if the individual is a dependent (such as a child or an adult with a severe disability). Integrated Approaches for Intake and Registration Both intake and registration can be costly, so integrating intake and registration among different social protection programs is an efficient way to reduce costs. When different programs require common information from similar population groups, it can be efficient to share intake and registration processes rather than collecting the same information multiple times. One example of such sharing is a social registry, which supports intake and registration and the assessment of socioeconomic needs and conditions for multiple programs. This enables program administrators to share resources for intake and registration and reduce duplication of work and administrative costs. It can also simplify intake and registration procedures for people, allowing them to apply for multiple benefits and services with a common application form so that they do not have to provide the same information over and over at different offices. 3 | SOURCEBOOK SUMMARY | CHAPTER 4: INTAKE, REGISTRATION AND ASSESSMENT OF NEEDS AND CONDITIONS MAY 2022 ASSESSMENT OF NEEDS AND CONDITIONS The assessment of needs and conditions is the process of profiling registered individuals, families, or households according to various assessment tools (such as socioeconomic welfare measures, risk profiles, labor profiles, etc.). That profiling is the main output of this phase and informs the determination of potential eligibility for specific programs and the benefits or services that may be awarded. On a broader level, an outcome of this phase is its measurement of the need for social protection programs, which can help agencies in planning, budgeting, and coordination. The instruments and techniques for assessing needs and conditions vary depending on the characteristics of the target group. Socioeconomic Assessment of Needs and Conditions • Means Testing (MT), which can include income testing, asset testing, or both. They rely on a high degree of labor market formality and interoperability of information systems. • Proxy Means Testing (PMT), which estimates a family’s socioeconomic welfare using a composite measure that estimates welfare or an index as a weighted score based on observable household characteristics. PMT is used when actual income or consumption is difficult to measure or observe, such as in situations of high informality. • Hybrid Means Testing (HMT), which combines MT and PMT by gathering information on a household’s observable income that can be verified against independent sources, as well as collecting information on certain household assets with the purpose of estimating the income or consumption that cannot be verified, as in PMT. • Community-based targeting (CBT), which uses community members’ or leaders’ local knowledge to identify program participants according to those leaders’ subjective view of household needs. The rationale for using CBT is that local knowledge may be more accurate than any outsider’s determination. CBT can be used i) to prioritize which households will be registered (input to intake and registration); ii) to help validate income and consumption scores or estimates; iii) as a tool for directly assessing the needs and conditions of families in a community and ranking them from richest to poorest. • Socioeconomic assessments may be conducted on demand or administrator-driven. With an on-demand approach, the absolute measure of registrants’ well-being is computed (for example, in terms of their aggregate income, the value of their assets, or their absolute PMT score). With an administrator-driven approach, the measure used is often a ranking of households from poorest to richest. The measure of well-being is thus relative to the other households in the group. Assessing and Profiling Job Seekers and the Unemployed • Rules-based categorization, which is used when the caseworker’s capacity and the information available are limited, the caseworker may simply categorize applicants according to group characteristics, such as the duration of unemployment, their age, or any disabilities. • Statistical profiling, which are tools that use econometric modeling to analyze data on job seekers and predict their likelihood of returning to work (as a measure of their employability) according to a statistical model. 4 | SOURCEBOOK SUMMARY | CHAPTER 4: INTAKE, REGISTRATION AND ASSESSMENT OF NEEDS AND CONDITIONS MAY 2022 • Caseworkers assessments. Caseworkers often rely primarily on information collected during interviews, qualitative tools, and their own clinical assessment of the applicants. • Caseworker assessments with data-assisted profiling. This approach incorporates statistical profiling tools into caseworker assessments. Disability Assessments • Medical assessments documenting health-related reasons for difficulties and where disability is seen as a medical problem located in an individual’s body. • Functional assessments to qualify as “having a disability” and determining the degree of disability and the nature of support needed. • Comprehensive disability assessments is based on an interactional or bio-psycho-social view of disability. The focus is not on what the person has, but what the person can do. Social Risk Assessments for Vulnerable Individuals Caseworker assessments are the most common tool for diagnosing the risk factors facing vulnerable individuals. Risk assessments may be conducted in multiple phases, for example, with caseworkers conducting an initial screening to identify possible vulnerabilities, followed by a more in-depth assessment of risk factors. Recognizing that individuals operate within a family and community, these risk factors are commonly assessed at three levels: individuals (such as mental or physical health), family (such as parental depression or child abuse) and community levels (unsafe neighborhoods or community violence.) Social workers typically combine formal and informal methods in their assessments. Formal assessment tools often include interviews, questionnaires, and checklists. Informal assessment, on the other hand, relies heavily on the caseworker’s interpersonal soft skills to build trust, observe behavioral patterns, and entice the individual or family members to divulge often-private information that would help assess their needs, conditions, and vulnerabilities. Integrated Approaches for Assessing Needs and Conditions People often face multiple needs and risk factors. Working in silos, agencies or offices can miss that complexity, resulting in ineffective or mismatched interventions. Integrated approaches that pool the skills and knowledge of different bureaucracies can better assess complex needs and conditions, resulting in packages of benefits and services that are more closely tailored to individual needs and conditions. Common assessments of specific factors may also be shared across programs. As with intake and registration, multiple programs may require similar information for assessing needs and conditions. This is common with assessments of socioeconomic status, which may be needed for many programs, such as means-tested social pensions for the elderly poor or disabled; activation benefits and service packages for low-income workers; social services for low-income families; and need-based scholarships and means-tested health insurance subsidies. While there may be program-specific requirements, these programs all also require some sort of socioeconomic assessment of needs and conditions. Social registries support integrated approaches to assessments by providing integrated information on socioeconomic status to multiple programs. 5 | SOURCEBOOK SUMMARY | CHAPTER 4: INTAKE, REGISTRATION AND ASSESSMENT OF NEEDS AND CONDITIONS MAY 2022 Reassessment In addition to the initial assessment of needs and conditions, most programs or social registries have “recertification requirements.” While that is the conventional term for it, we prefer to use the term “reassessment requirements” as it links back to the assessment phase along the delivery chain and because there is no guarantee that anyone would be certified or recertified, which essentially means being deemed eligible for a benefit or service. The periodicity of reassessment varies across programs and countries, and even within programs across types of beneficiaries. Several factors influence the periodicity of reassessment: (1) objectives of the program; (2) characteristics of the intended population; (3) administrative capacity; (4) whether the original intake and registration was on demand or administrator-driven; and (5) (usually implicit) attitudes toward the intended populations. INFORMATION SYSTEMS SUPPORTING INTAKE, REGISTRATION, AND ASSESSMENT OF NEEDS AND CONDITIONS Social Registries Social registries are defined as information systems that support the processes of intake, registration, and the assessment of needs and conditions to determine potential eligibility for one or more programs. Social registries are efficient for program administrators, who do not have to collect the same information from the same people, and for clients, who do not have to provide the same information separately to multiple programs. Social Registries and Interoperability with Other Administrative Information Systems Social registries may draw on data from other information systems. Data can be collected from other administrative systems to prefill application forms or supplement self-reported information provided by registrants. Integration with other systems verifies the information captured from the client by making sure that it matches information contained in other authoritative administrative systems (external cross-checks). Finally, data resulting from the assessment of needs and conditions can be delivered through the social registry to other programs to help them make eligibility and enrollment decisions. Data Protection, Privacy, and Security Data privacy risks can arise from any activity that collects, stores, or processes personal data. These risks include exposure of personal data, data and identity theft, discrimination or persecution, exclusion, unjust treatment, and surveillance. Social registries work with socioeconomic data, as well as data sourced from multiple government systems to run assessments of needs and conditions for individuals, families, and households for social protection programs. Furthermore, the data collected in a social registry is not only of a personal nature, but it necessarily cuts across systems in order to assess needs and conditions. Given that social registries involve significant amounts of personal identifying and socioeconomic information, it is critical that legal instruments be implemented to support information security and protection of this information. Such protections—which include legislation, 6 | SOURCEBOOK SUMMARY | CHAPTER 4: INTAKE, REGISTRATION AND ASSESSMENT OF NEEDS AND CONDITIONS MAY 2022 policy measures, protocols, and the like—are critical not only to the good functioning of the system, but also to the credibility and trust of the system. As such, the development of a social registry should be articulated around the concept of digital governance, including access to information, cybersecurity, data security, data confidentiality, privacy standards, and personal data protection. Consent Framework and Consent Architecture Consent is at the heart of putting power over collected personal data back in the hands of the individual. The personal data collected belongs to the individual—the “data subject,” as the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) puts it. For that reason, good international practice not only looks to assure strong data protection guarantees, but also to put control of the use of that collected data back into the hands of the individual. A key element in that regard is requiring those processing or controlling data to acquire user consent. This consent is at the heart of the notion of data privacy: it conditions the collection of personal data on the exclusive use for particular purposes. When the data are not being used for such permissioned ends they are by and large to be kept secure and unused. Informed consent requires certain, specific elements: it must be freely given, specific, informed, and unambiguous. Designing a System that Assures Data Protection and Privacy Good international practices espouse an integrative, life-cycle vision of data protection and data privacy. Of particular note is the privacy-by-design (PbD) approach, which requires complementary controls at each stage of the life cycle. The PbD approach can be applied to social registries and foundational ID systems, to offer valuable guidance for meeting the requirements set by the GDPR. Although speaking to many of the elements discussed, the PbD approach takes a larger view, moving beyond the legal framework and the principles or guidelines governing data processing to speak to system design and implementation, with a particular eye to the fashion in which individuals are engaged. 7 | SOURCEBOOK SUMMARY | CHAPTER 4: INTAKE, REGISTRATION AND ASSESSMENT OF NEEDS AND CONDITIONS MAY 2022 INSTITUTIONAL ARRANGEMENTS The institutional arrangements for intake and registration and assessment of needs and conditions involve a variety of actors. These can include local actors, central agencies, and partner agencies. Depending on the target populations involved, intake and registration require a direct client interface. The assessment of needs and conditions is also often carried out locally—especially caseworker assessments. With socioeconomic assessments, however, central information systems may automate the aggregation of measures of income and consumption. The institutional arrangements for intake and registration depend greatly on whether the client interaction is in person or online, and whether intake and registration is on demand or administrator-driven. CONCLUSION In sum, several factors promote accurate and efficient intake and registration and assessment of needs and conditions: • Simple, human-centered processes (whether digital or in person) • Well-trained intake officers or caseworkers with interpersonal soft skills • Accommodations for people with access barriers (disability adaptations, language translation, etc.) • Short, easily understood intake questionnaires and application forms based on the principle of minimum information collection • Use of information already in the system to avoid collecting it again • Strategically located intake points that are close to the individuals in their communities • Adequate and ideally permanent network of client interface that would allow for dynamic inclusion, such that anyone can register at any time • Integrated approaches to intake and registration that can potentially enable people to be considered simultaneously for multiple programs 8 | SOURCEBOOK SUMMARY | CHAPTER 4: INTAKE, REGISTRATION AND ASSESSMENT OF NEEDS AND CONDITIONS MAY 2022