Over time interacting with various authorities and services digitally has become regular part of my life. Sometimes it´s depending on my lifesituation what services i use the most. For instance the tax office, police permit services, KELA (The Social Insurance Institution of Finland) and bank are parties with whom i tend to deal with digitally.

KELA, OmaKanta and pension fund administration

Last time when i was envolved with KELA, i paid the healthcare fee for students in higher education. Everyone who is studying in a traditional university or a university of applied sciences, is obliged to pay the fee for each term. Students has to pay it self-imposed, because KELA doesn´t send a bill for it. I pay the fee through the e-services, dericted to own online bank.

The European health care card i have already had for a long period of time. Once you have plead it, the card will be renewed automatically. When we had a baby, we received a maternity pack from KELA and KELA also pays child benefit monthly.

I visit my own health care data, provided by OmaKanta, regularly. I usually renew my prescriptions via OmaKanta, check example my labratory answers and read what healthcare professionals have written, if i have visited e.g. a doctor or a nurse.

My pension insurance company is Elo. At he moment the amount of my pension could not be seen via Elo´s pages but i have used Elo´s services before and checked the current amount of my future pension. I have been in touch with Elo by sending messages through their websites after i have logged in by using strong identification and I have also used the opportunity to have chat conversation with the personel. Message exhange with Elo has always worked out easily.

Digital shops

I visited eBay and Trivago for this assignement. Price level in eBay varied a lot, depending on what you were browsing. I have booked a vacation in a finnish hotel in the near future via the hotels own pages. Now i checked the same hotel by using trivago and the price was much higher. Trivago and eBay weren´t very fluent to use in my oppinion: websites were indistinct and clumsy and i felt insecure to use them.

Domesticity is an important value for me and i tend to purchase finnish products and services when ever it´s possible. I have been satisfied with the deliveries and customer service together with exchanges and returns, managed by finnish companies. Contrary to what is usually thought, prices are not always cheaper on the internet or in big multinational shops.

I work as a welfare coordinator in my home municipality. We do lots of co-operation with our wellbeing service county Pohde (Pohjois-Pohjanmaan hyvinvointialue). Pohde has developed an website called Reittis, which is designed to help working towards wellbeing. From Reittis, you can find versatile content concerning different themes in life, for example manners of living, culture and mental wellbeing. There is information produced by professionals, self-care instructions and also events and activity designed to support wellness. In addition to professionals, regular county residents are also able to use the sites to increace their wellbeing and health.

I was able to test Reittis beforehand already on the development phase and give feedback. Based on my experiences in social and health care, i paid especially attention in to the comprehensibility and usability of the sites. Now that Reittis has been launched, i visited the sites again because i was interested in how they look like. I noticed that many things had improved comparing to the developmental phase and Reittis seemed much more usable. Also the general appereance had freshend up.

Digital gap

I have worked among people who have challenges in participating the society fully. Many disapled persons need support starting from taking care of their daily things, not to mention things that are not happening daily. Nowadays the majority of population run their daily routines smoothly on the internet: paying bills, dealing with authorities and ordering products and services happens quickly where ever you are, regardless what time of the day it is. People who have various needs of support, often have massive challenges in these things. Taking care of daily things online, often requires strong identification. To be able to identifiy your self online, you must have e.g. bank ID. To get a bank ID, you have to start a multiphased process, starting from getting yourself an ID card or passport. To most of the people this is an easy thing to deal with, but people who have different kinds of challenges in their lives, it´s not that simple and it requires lots of arrangements to even start the prosess. In sparsely populated areas it´s even more challenging because of long distances and a lack of puplic transport. Many services are located far away and you migth need transport services and a person to support you. Another challenge disabled persons might face in online transacting, is the economic aspec: purchasing the devices and services you need in the digital world can become a burden hard to overcome because financial compentence can be hard as it is.

Using the devices and acting in the digital world has it´s own features that need attention: when having e.g. learning difficulties and different kinds of sensory impairments, support is often needed. Structure of the invisible virtual environment can be hard to comprehend and using the devices requires lots of practice, special support and adaptions. Digital surroundings can include dangers, which can be dufficult to regognize. However, in my opinion, these needs shouldn´t be seen as an obsticle, rather than a dimension of equality. With the right kind of solutions and support digital world can offer possibilites and ways to interact, function and participate in the society fully for everyne.

Digital Compentence Test

I consider myself as a critical and careful operator in the digital surroundings. According to the digital competence test my strenghts were data protection, social awarenes and health. Configuration and automation are to be read as my weaknesses. I think it´s always healthy to have consideration when using internet and different kinds of platforms. It´s also good to have certain questining, what it comes to own skills. Allthough it´s always good to evaluate ones actions thorougly and follow consideration, fears shouldn´t however become overwhelming and construct an obsticle in the digital world.

Self evaluation

The Digital Competence Test was previously unknown to me. The test was useful and it gave me lot to think about. It was interensting to see the results and i think they are useful paticularly in developing skills and improving possibilities in safe and responsible online behavior. I definitely will exploit the test in the future and recommend it also to others.

Work experience among people who are in a vulnerable position in society, has given me perspective towards challenges in involvement. It is important to knowledge that digitalisation can enlarge the equality and create a gap between people. It is equally important to minimize this gap in society and local communities as well as help different kinds of people to partisipate fully and to become seen and heard.

I commented these blogposts:

blogi.savonia.fi/hetak/digi-citizen/

blogi.savonia.fi/ingachirvanen/digi-citizen/

blogi.savonia.fi/sivamprasath/digi-citizen/