Oise CCI - An e-procedure pioneer

In January 2005, ACFCI, the Assembly of French Chambers of Commerce and Industry, launched a national online formalities platform known as CFEnet (www.cfenet.cci.fr). Entrepreneurs can now record the creation or cessation of a business and changes in its particulars via the Internet.
The Bordeaux, Paris and Oise CCIs constitute CFEnet’s steering committee, following it through from conception to entry into its current experimental phase. One year after the launch, the platform is meeting the needs of a variety of players: business formality centres (CFEs), ACFCI, CCI pilots and entrepreneurs. «  The Oise CCI hopes to use new information and communications technology to modernise its service offer so it naturally agreed to become an experimental site for CFEnet. Our proximity to our clients has made it easy for us to ask them to test the platform and to gauge their opinion of the service it offers », explains Pierre Trocnet, head of the CFE’s Reception-Economic Information Department at the Oise CCI.
By using an interactive procedure, companies can reduce their paperwork yet store the information they give. Recorded declarations can be completed or modified later.
This innovative tool for making business procedures easier was set up under the provisions of the Dutreil Act for Economic Initiative (2003), Article 4 of which authorises an entrepreneur to « carry out the registration formalities for his company from home by the Internet », whereas before, only a personal appearance or postal communications were permitted.  

Further initiatives
The panel of companies and business formalities specialists contacted by the Oise CCI were enthusiastic. Paradoxically, the Internet brings companies and administrative bodies closer since personalised interactive dialogue is possible using a set of targeted question-answers. Companies can also contact their CFE by email and follow the progress of their declarations.
After the creation of Net-entreprises in 2000, the CCI portal (www.cci.fr) in 2002, and CFEnet in 2005, the trend towards the dematerialization of administrative procedures seems to have taken off both at national and local level and the Oise CCI does not intend to stop there. « For our CFE, we have set up a system in the form of Electronic Data Exchanges (EDE) in XML mode for the transmission of formalities to organisations and administrative departments. Moreover, we are developing information and communications technologies for businesses, in particular with the setting up of an electronic signature registry, Chambersign, to allow companies to dematerialize their dealings with the authorities, clients and suppliers», explains Pierre Trocnet.