Complaints in “Diya” about the work of state bodies: digital feedback without an accountability mechanism

In the “Action” application, a new functionality is being prepared for launch – submitting complaints about the work of state bodies in the format of text and voice messages. The information will be sent to the ministries, and the responsible officials will have the technical ability to receive it in an operational mode. The introduction of the new function is positioned as part of the digital transformation of public administration, but the mechanisms for responding to complaints, recording responses, and holding officials accountable for ignoring them are not specified. In addition, the convenient form leaves open questions — does it change the essence of communication between the citizen and the state system and how effective will it be?

A voice against bureaucracy: in “Diya” they are launching the function of filing complaints against state bodies

The Diya mobile application is scheduled to launch a function that will allow users to send voice and text complaints about the activities of government bodies. This option was announced by the Minister of Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov. According to him, user messages will be sent directly to the responsible ministers. It is expected that this will provide prompt feedback and allow faster detection of problems in the work of the public sector.

The digital architecture of this function is built on the principle of the shortest path from the user to the person in charge. A person who has encountered a problem in a government agency enters the application, selects an institution from the list, records a voice message or enters text. This message automatically enters a separate digital space, the so-called “drejbord”, and it is there, according to the logic of the function, that it will be seen by the minister who oversees the relevant area. At the same time, the user leaves the application without processing according to the requirements of the official procedure and without additional documents, which are usually attached. He simply expresses his opinion – by voice or text – within the application interface.

The whole process looks primitively simple, taking a few minutes, and does not require additional registration, identity verification or the creation of a separate electronic account, because identification is already embedded in “Diya” as a platform. Thus, all complaints and reviews will have confirmed authorship and are automatically attached to the real user profile, which, on the one hand, simplifies processing, and on the other hand, eliminates anonymity.

In addition, in the future it is planned to integrate a virtual assistant into the function – a tool based on artificial intelligence, which will receive complaints, analyze them and distribute them according to directions. AI will become part of the digital support that can be turned to when difficulties arise when interacting with government structures. Its role will be technical facilitation of dialogue, automatic recognition of problems, as well as pre-sorting and transfer within the system. According to the idea of ​​the Ministry of Digital, the very function of complaints is an attempt to transfer the experience of real contact with a state institution to an environment where for the majority of Ukrainians, the smartphone has long been the focus of daily life. The entire logic of the new tool is based on the idea of ​​a direct, minimized process, without intermediate stages and without barriers.

The new feature will be available for complaints against central authorities, and possibly regional institutions as well. Each complaint will be recorded in the internal system, and authorized officials will have access to it. At the same time, the message will remain in the user’s access history, which will allow tracking whether it was read or processed. Currently, it is not known whether a person will receive an answer to his signal, but the technical possibility of transmitting information is already being implemented.

It should be noted that the new functionality differs from most services in “Diya”, which are focused on submitting applications, uploading documents or receiving certificates. In this case, it is not about a transaction, but about recording the experience of interaction with a state body. This appeal is not about a specific service, but about a general evaluation of the work of the institution, its head or procedures. Therefore, the digital interface in which all this is implemented becomes a technical channel through which experiences that were previously private are transmitted. The possibility to leave a complaint is included in the functionality, but its further fate depends on the organization of processes that are outside the boundaries of this digital solution.

Complaints function in “Action”: a simple form is a complex responsibility

The idea of ​​a digital possibility to leave complaints about the work of state bodies at first glance looks convenient and useful: a person no longer needs to make an appointment for a personal appointment with an official, spend time on the road, look for reception contacts or wait for a connection with a hotline operator, which is often busy or does not answer at all. Instead of a multi-level bureaucratic procedure — a minimum of actions in the mobile application. The idea looks effective precisely because it creates a feeling of direct contact without intermediaries, delays and formalism.

According to its logic, this function repeats the model of boxes of complaints, appeals and proposals, which are placed in state institutions and should look like a feedback channel between the citizen and the institution, allowing free expression of comments, claims, evaluations. However, over time, these boxes almost lost their meaning due to the reluctance of officials to work with uncontrolled, unformatted and often emotional signals. In addition, they do not fit into the reporting logic and require additional actions. Instead, the new feature in Action builds on the same principle, but in a digital environment, with additional routing, archiving and analytics capabilities. Its introduction once again actualizes the issue of not only technical implementation, but also the system’s readiness to receive direct signals from below.

Despite the obvious convenience for the user, the innovation is accompanied by a large number of fundamental uncertainties and risks. First of all, legal. Currently, it is not known whether the complaints left in “Diya” will be equated to official appeals from citizens. If it is only a feedback option, then it will not be subject to the Law of Ukraine “On Appeals of Citizens”. In this case, there will be no obligation on the part of the officials regarding the terms of consideration, the form of the answer, as well as the obligation to respond. If the complaints are recognized as full appeals, then another set of questions arises: who records the moment of receipt, how are messages registered, how is compliance with deadlines monitored, is there a responsible executor, does the applicant receive a written response?

It has not yet been announced how these processes will be organized. It is not specified whether the user will receive a notification about the status of the complaint, its transmission, the result of consideration or rejection. There is no technical explanation of how appeals are filtered, because some of them do not contain adequate information. It is not known whether all complaints reach the minister, or only a part selected by moderation. It is also not clear whether the messages will undergo a preliminary evaluation for the presence of threats, insults, fake data, or whether they will automatically be sent to state boards. This is critical, as it is a direct channel of communication with high-level officials, who may be overwhelmed by the system in the first days of launch.

Scaling is another challenge of this innovation. If the feature becomes fully operational, the flow of complaints could be very significant. In the absence of a clear processing structure and support teams, ministries may not be able to cope with the workload and routine work with real-time digital feedback. The lack of trained staff and algorithms for processing complaints and appeals will lead to the fact that feedback on them will simply accumulate without being read or processed. This, in turn, will create a gap between the user’s expectation and real practice, which will only increase mistrust of government bodies.

Another controversial issue is the use of artificial intelligence in this process. It is planned that part of the interaction with the user will take place through an AI assistant. It is he who will receive voice calls, recognize their content, classify and forward them. On the one hand, it allows you to automate the flow and simplify sorting. On the other hand, it increases the feeling of distance between people and the government. When a person complains not to a person, but to an interface, it changes the very nature of the appeal. Its emotional component, context, intonation can be lost, and the feedback itself is reduced to a technical signal.

Plugging in AI can help with filtering, but also carries the risk of subject misrecognition or misdirection. In addition, the use of algorithms for pre-processing signals calls into question the transparency of the entire system: it is not clear under what criteria the messages will be considered important, who will be responsible for rejecting requests and whether the applicant will have access to the full history of the processing of his complaint.

No less sensitive is the issue of lack of feedback. The user does not receive confirmation that his complaint has been considered, does not see the results, does not know whether something has been changed. All these elements turn the function into a one-sided act – without response and consequences. In such a configuration, the initiative becomes an information unloading platform and not a management mechanism. This goes against the very logic of transparency and accountability, which is proclaimed as the main goal.

Among additional risks that are not discussed publicly, but are relevant to the functioning of the new initiative, is the problem of institutional immunity from criticism. In many ministries and central authorities, a culture of avoiding public response to inconvenient signals has developed over the years. Even if technically an official receives a complaint, this does not mean that it will fall into the sphere of management decisions. Informal filtering often operates in authorities: criticism that does not relate to legally defined violations is treated as “subjective opinion” that does not require a response. In such an environment, Action complaints may be perceived as emotional noise or burden rather than a source for policy or practice revisions. A digital platform in this case will not solve the problems, but will only simulate openness using modern terminology and interface instead of real accountability.

The issue of reactive use of complaints remains unresolved. If the system will work only as an archive of appeals, without an internal mechanism of prioritization and actions, then it will not have any advantage over a regular mailbox. But if complaints begin to be used as an indicator of the effectiveness of officials, this will create another danger – manipulation of the flow of applications. In large institutions, there will be a temptation to technically influence the visibility of criticism, to reduce the number of complaints with the help of restrictions, redirections, internal censorship. This creates the risk of replacing real feedback with convenient and controlled feedback.

It should also be taken into account that the content of complaints often goes beyond the functionality that the state can process algorithmically. Most appeals will include a description of events, subjective circumstances, context, nuances of relationships with specific performers. Such material is not read by the system, is not formalized and is not aggregated. It must be read manually, analyzed, checked. This requires time, qualifications and responsibility – three factors that rarely occur simultaneously in the existing structure of personnel support of authorities.

Of additional concern is the storage, protection, and use of data transmitted through Diya. Complaints, especially in voice format, contain personal information, intonation, occasional references to third parties. The question of how long these records will be kept, who has access to them, in what format they are archived and how they can be used in the future remains without public clarification. In the event of a conflict with the same agency against which a complaint was filed, access to a citizen’s complaint history potentially creates a tool of pressure or bias.

It is purely procedurally unclear how the same standard of handling appeals across all ministries will be ensured. If each agency has its own internal response model, this will lead to fragmentation: in one structure, complaints will be considered, in the second – they will be ignored, in the third – they will simply be stored without consequences. As a result, the state will not receive a single feedback standard, and citizens will not have a single interaction experience.

So, the complaint function in Diya, with all its technological novelty, exacerbates old, unsolved problems of public administration: lack of a culture of responsibility, mistrust of the system’s response, underdevelopment of internal supervision, lack of effective disciplinary mechanisms. All this is superimposed on a digital envelope, which by itself is not capable of changing the way decisions are made. Without political will, action algorithms, a transparent structure, and clear accountability, the new complaint channel risks repeating the fate of many other participation tools that were created but did not become real levers of action.

The complaint function in “Action” does not raise questions about the interface – all questions are addressed to the content of the interaction. If the system does not specify that the feedback is binding rather than illustrative, then the new tool will remain within the bounds of formal presence. It can be launched, tested, supplemented with artificial intelligence, but it will not change anything until the official receives the obligation to bear responsibility, and the citizen – a guarantee that he will be heard not by his voice into the microphone, but by action in response to his complaint or appeal.