The Malay Mail interviewed me on my views of the implementation of the new e-Court System Phase 2 some time last year. Some of the issues highlighted below have now been resolved. I am posting this for record purpose.
In their article entitled “Lawyers required to go digital by 2018“, I said the following:-
Foong Cheng Leong, the Kuala Lumpur Bar’s Information Technology and Publication Committee chairman, noted that e-filing is partly aimed at ending the maintenance of actual physical files and saves time with the skipping of physical file searches.
“Before e-filing, the court had problem organising their files and many files went missing resulting the loss of judicial and litigants’ time. The e-filing system also allows documents to be viewed quickly without the need to look for the file,” he said.
Foong said the second phase of the e-filing system had some improvements such as a better online file search system that now includes searching of court minutes, but he highlighted several issues such as the use of the security token which he felt was “unnecessary”.
“Although it is now available at an affordable rate, the use of the token creates a ripple effect. For example, the lawyer now would need to apply for the token and learn how to use and install it, safe-keep, protect and observe the expiry date of the token,” he said, arguing that there were other ways to ensure security or to ensure the right person is filing a court document.
He said the online file search function where users have to pay RM8 or RM12 depending on the court tiers for a 30-minute viewing period should be changed, suggesting that the time limit should be scrapped and instead replaced with a pay-per-file system.
The file search function also only allows users to view and print files page by page, but should instead be changed to allow users to download the files to view them directly on their computers, he said.
“The current system still has a lot of bugs. It ought to be have been beta tested properly by users, in particular, the lawyers before rolling them out,” he said, citing as example the timer in the file search system suddenly resetting to 0:00 before the time is actually up.
On the closure of the Service Bureau to lawyers, I stated the following:-
Foong similarly said: “However, the service bureau should still remain to assist lawyers to file their documents. Not every lawyer has litigation cases often and some may even do one or two a year. It makes no commercial sense sometimes to pay for the token to do e-filing. Nevertheless, the Court should allow other parties to open service bureaus to cater the needs of fellow lawyers.”
In Malay Mail’s subsequent article entitled “No more 5am queues to file lawsuits“, I was quoted stating the following:-
Foong Cheng Leong, the Kuala Lumpur Bar’s Information Technology and Publication Committee chairman, said issues that law firms in peninsular Malaysia faced in moving to a new online court filing system had caused the long queues.
During that period, the helpdesk for the online system was overflowing with requests for assistance, with many lawyers complaining that it was not picking up their phone calls, he said.
“I think the long queues at the e-filing service bureau is due to the sudden surge of requests to do e-filing. As many lawyers had problem migrating to the new system, they have no choice but to use the e-filing service bureau. This adds to the usual crowd of lawyers who did not subscribe to the e-filing system.
“The Court was unable to cope with the sudden surge of request and resulted in very long lines. The Court had to limit the number of people who could use the service otherwise their staff would be staying in Court past the normal working hours,” he told Malay Mail Online when asked to weigh in on the issue.
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