HD59 - Report on the implementation of the Point of Sale, Automated License Delivery System


Executive Summary:
Item 392, Paragraph C.2. of Chapter 951 of the Virginia Acts of Assembly, 2005 states:

"C 2.) The Director of the Department of Game and Inland Fisheries shall provide a report by September 1, 2005 to the Chairman of the Senate Finance and House Appropriations Committees, and the Director of the Department of Planning and Budget, including, but not limited to, the status of the implementation of the point of sale system, expenditures, and a timeline of implementation."

Background:

The Department has used manual license books to issue hunting and fishing licenses since 1916. This process has significant cost associated with printing, distribution, accounting and revenue collection because of the manual methods utilized. It is impractical to collect client information from the approximately 1.5 million forms that are issued every year. As a result, the agency does not have a comprehensive list of customers that purchase licenses. The implementation of an automated license delivery system (Point of Sale or POS) will enhance its business functions and customer relation.

The POS project will develop and implement an automated process for the delivery of hunting and fishing licenses to the public through the retail and governmental outlets currently utilized to distribute manual hunting and fishing licenses. This project is being completed with no major software purchases. The system is being developed using existing agency development platform. The system will be functional by July 1, 2005. Implementation will occur over the following 12 months.

The system will serve the agent network by relieving them of the need to manage license inventories, report periodic sales, and reconcile inventory twice a year. This relieves a large administrative burden from them. After the first full year of sales, the system will also hold the majority of customer information that can be recalled for quick and efficient sales in subsequent years.

The customer (hunter or angler) will be served by a consistent availability of the licenses since there will be no inventory to deplete. Lost license replacement will be handled system wide, removing the requirement for customers to return to the original place of purchase. Second purchases will be faster because primary demographic information will already be in the system speeding the time to delivery. Upon completion of system implementation, when all agents are automated, licenses will be valid for one year from the date of purchase rather than the current hunting or fishing license year (§ 29.1-328) and the Board of Game and Inland Fisheries will be able to develop a "Sportsmen" license that will allow hunters and anglers to purchase a single license that provides comprehensive privileges to hunt and fish in the Commonwealth (§ 29.l-310.1). This will provide a convenience to customers by reducing the amount of paper and the number of times required to purchase a license in a year.

The agency will benefit from the development of a customer database. The printing, distribution and accounting for licenses will be eliminated except as noted below for the duck blind licenses and saltwater boat licenses. Accounting for license sales will be automated with the hosted system and remove the need for auditing, reconciliation, collections and deposits of revenue manually. Revenue collection from license sales will be faster, improving the cash flow for the agency. Agency exposure to non-compliant agents will be greatly reduced with improved and faster management of the rights and privileges through the automated system. Enforcement efforts will be improved with better and faster access to the license information. Utilizing the internet based, hosting model will provide opportunities for the agency to use automation for other activities such as harvest checking.

Licenses dealing with duck blinds per § 29.1-348 will not be issued using the automated delivery system. All other licenses and/or privileges currently issued via manual paper licenses dealing with recreational hunting, fresh and saltwater fishing and temporary boat registration will be delivered via the automated license delivery system. The physical saltwater boat decal will be provided to the customer through direct fulfillment after the automated sale of the privilege.

The POS system will be implemented by enhancing a prototype system developed and tested with Wal-Mart Corporation and Virginia.gov (formally VIPNet of VITA). This system was developed and deployed to 78 Wal-Mart stores throughout Virginia in the Fall of 2004. Based on the prototype deployment, some enhancements where identified which will be implemented in the host system by Virginia.gov. The accounting and agent management system developed to support the prototype will be enhanced to provide additional functionality to support ACH transfers from agents, maintain agent accounts, maintain tables, files and privileges on the hosting system and provide management reports to support agent management.