Overview
Since 1958, government agents have acted as a link between British Columbians and the provincial government in their role of ensuring public access to government services in communities throughout the province. Today, these agents continue to be the primary access point for over 1,000 government-related services, including everything from the purchase of marriage licenses to gas permits.

In 1988, CRISP (Cash Register Information System Project) was replaced with the more advanced Revenue Management System (GARMS), which was developed and installed in government agent offices throughout B.C. The new system allowed all transactions to be conducted from specific computer terminals, linked to a central branch where GARMS facilitated cash management, inventory management and reporting. This system allowed payments from 58 government agent offices to be collected, processed and tracked from one central location.

In 1990, TP Systems was awarded the GARMS support and maintenance contract. Since then, TP Systems has won all RFPs pertaining to GARMS for over 16 years.

Solution
In 2002, TP Systems presented a three-year information technology plan to government agents of B.C., which was accepted.This plan outlined several opportunities for improving government operations, including the migration of GARMS from the MVS system to a Windows platform, using a phased approach. In 2003, TP Systems successfully launched Phase 1 with eGARMS, developed to reduce the operational costs of the MVS mainframe and which uses a web-based front-end to interface with existing IMS transactions.

eGARMS was, and is presently, an Intranet solution that enables government agent staff to access it from any PC with an Internet connection. This web-based system has become the most accessible and easy to use payment tool available to the public for all government-administered services, licenses and fees.

Benefits
Over the past several years, TP Systems has helped a number of public sector organizations move towards web-based accessibility. TP Systems’ consultants chose Microsoft.Net when developing eGARMS because of its ability to create user-friendly interfaces within existing applications. In turn, Microsoft.Net offers a long list of benefits:

• Provides a set of web pages that other non MVS-based systems can use to access GARMS.
  
• Provides a set of services that web-based systems can call from their application.
  
• Uses GUI controls, like drop-downs and radio buttons, making GARMS easier to use.
  
• Reduces the number of GARMS transactions by allowing simple client side-edits to take place.
  
• Offers additional search capabilities for service codes, stock, prepaid accounts and vendors.
  
• Streamlines many screen functions.

Project Related Development
TP Systems was involved in another government agent project with Mineral Titles Online (MTO). MTO is an Internet-based mineral titles administration system that allows the mineral exploration industry to acquire and maintain mineral titles. First, miners select the area on a seamless digital GIS map of British Columbia. Then they process their payment transactions online. Government agents recognized the importance of permitting miners to make payments by cash, cheque, debit or prepaid account payments. TP Systems proposed a solution to accommodate the miners’ needs.

As of January 2005, miners can now go to a Community Access Terminal (CATS) and have their order processed using a payment method of their choice. When the miner gets to the MTO pay screen on their terminal, there is an option to pay by credit card or at a GA counter. If the miner chooses to pay at a GA counter, they bring their MTO transaction information, make their payment and receive an authorization number from GARMS/eGARMS. Then they go back to the terminal and enter the authorization number on the MTO payment screen. The MTO system verifies the details and confirms that both the service fee and the amount paid are the same. If the authorization number matches up to the GARMS transaction, the purchase is complete.