The Veterans Affairs Department recently deployed a modern, centralized mechanism for digitally delivering timely updates to those it serves: VANotify.
Before it, snail mail was one of only two options the department’s various business lines had to send out certain notices. VA’s Office of Information and Technology shaped and launched the fresh open-source software-inspired platform, in collaboration with global software consultancy ThoughtWorks.
“Our OIT strategy is to reduce the amount of custom code in our footprint, and adopting proven open-source products where they exist is a key tactic to achieve that goal,” VA’s Chief Technology Officer Charles Worthington told Nextgov in a recent email.
Aside from ensuring their VA contact information and communication preferences are up to date, veterans don’t need to make any special moves to use VANotify. It’s essentially a shared service that appropriate VA teams can leverage to push out personalized notifications.
Specifically, the platform uses a ThoughtWorks-built application programming interface to send emails and texts directly to veterans. Those contain meaningful information that previously was only disseminated in the mail or through the agency’s specific, VEText app. Such alerts might confirm the receipt of benefits applications, notify veterans of changes to their VA account, or help them track some pharmacy deliveries in an easier, more digitally savvy way.
“VANotify can in the future facilitate two-way communication between a veteran and VA services like a chatbot, though today its major use cases are focused on one-way notifications such as updates on prescription shipments or application submission confirmations,” Worthington said.
It’s reaching American veterans now, but the tool’s codebase roots back to an original platform that was built by a governm ..
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