What happens in Belgium when you have a legal obligation to do some administrative task & you can’t b/c of bad tech?

People living in Belgium are sometimes legally obligated to perform an administrative task. At the same time, sometimes the only mechanism to do so imposes some technology that’s actually exclusive.

E.g. you cannot register/deregister from a commune because your browser is not compatible with the website.

So the question is: have there been any court cases where someone did not comply with an obligation because there is no longer an analog way to do it? Are there any protections in place?

Camus ,
@Camus@jlai.lu avatar

You can deregister from a commune by going to the town hall and doing the request there, at least in Wallonia.

I know because for a long time most of the administrative tasks were only possible at the town halls. Being able to do administrative tasks via Internet is only a recent thing.

For Bruxelles, it depends of the commune: vivreabruxelles.be/s-inscrire-dans-sa-commune-et-…

ciferecaNinjo OP Mod ,

The Flemish gov claims people still have the option to visit the commune in person:

https://www.vlaanderen.be/agentschap-binnenlands-bestuur/blikvangers/gemeente-zonder-gemeentehuis

(last sentence of the 1st paragraph)

But I guess they cannot be speaking for Brussels. In any case, I would like to know what a court will do when someone fails to comply with a legal obligation because of a tech failure. Currently administrations seem to blame all failures on the users. If that happens in court that will be disturbing.

Camus ,
@Camus@jlai.lu avatar

What prevents you from registering in-person at the town hall?

ciferecaNinjo OP Mod , (edited )

They no longer carry out the process on-demand. You talk to someone who merely says “put the deregistration request in writing and mail it”. That’s not the front desk clerk either.. that’s when you actually talk to a human in the population department. When you follow through, they just ignore the mail.

Camus ,
@Camus@jlai.lu avatar

Weird. Which commune is that? I’m sure there are plenty of old people who still do procedures face-to-face

ciferecaNinjo OP Mod ,

Elderly people are directed to CPAS which apparently now offers a service to help them do admin tasks online.

Camus ,
@Camus@jlai.lu avatar

Interesting

ciferecaNinjo OP Mod ,

Yeah, it’s good and bad. It ensures that the elderly are not simply abandoned and excluded. But it means those who are technical but oppose being forced outside of Tor or being forced to use objectionable¹ tools will be marginalized because they are being separated out from the elderly. I wonder if this divide and conquer will block people from the right to be analog option.

  1. e.g. closed-source apps in Google’s walled-garden, spyware, CAPTCHAs, etc.
  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • •
  • Brussels
  • kamenrider
  • Rutgers
  • jeremy
  • Lexington
  • cragsand
  • mead
  • RetroGamingNetwork
  • loren
  • steinbach
  • xyz
  • PowerRangers
  • AnarchoCapitalism
  • WatchParties
  • WarhammerFantasy
  • supersentai
  • itdept
  • AgeRegression
  • mauerstrassenwetten
  • MidnightClan
  • space_engine
  • learnviet
  • bjj
  • Teensy
  • khanate
  • electropalaeography
  • neondivide
  • Mordhau
  • fandic
  • All magazines
    •