Citizen Disability Insurance Payments Trials In Australia On A Blockchain

The Australian federal government is testing a blockchain application to explore the utilization of blockchain technology to make ‘smart money’ for the country’s National disability insurance scheme (NDIS).

Dubbed “Making money Smart”, the trial is collectively developed by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial research Organization (CSIRO) – Australia’s federal science agency – and the Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA), one of the domestic ‘big four’ retail banks.

The proof-of-concept trial can use sensible contracts to make ‘smart money’ or ‘programmable money’ as blockchain tokens to the country’s disability insurance program, an announcement on Tuesday disclosed, enabling  participants and service providers to process payments conditionally.

In essence, the prototype permits citizens to manage their disability insurance arrange without the requirement for any paperwork or receipts ‘by enabling them to find, book and pay for services’ from service providers.

‘The NDIS was selected as the first case study for the proof of concept, as it involves highly personalised payment conditions,’ Australia’s federal science agency explained. ‘In the NDIS, participants have individualised plans that can contain multiple budget categories – each with different spending rules.’

In a notable endorsement of blockchain technology, the ‘smart money’ will also be designed to integrate with Australia’s New Payments Platform, a replacement national payments infrastructure that allows real-time low-value payments.

Dr. Mark Staples, senior principal researcher at CSIRO’s software and computational systems program stated:

“This has been a really interesting research project into how blockchain technology can integrate with new payments technologies to provide more choice, control and flexibility for conditional payments for NDIS participants and service providers.”

The proof-of-concept has already seen feedback from the govt and other stakeholders in the business with the prototype app presently being tested among NDIS users and service providers.

The application of blockchain technology can benefit all participants, CBA’s head of Experimentation and Blockchain Sophie gilder said, adding citizens will be empowered further while care-providers see fewer administration costs – all below larger visibility of the govt..

The CSIRO contains a history in developing blockchain solutions. Earlier this year, the federal agency led the formation of a new data consortium that features technology giant IBM to develop a nationwide blockchain platform enabled by smart-contracts across industries. The national science agency also proclaimed results of the primary international trial of its ‘Red Belly Blockchain’, scaling 30,000 transactions per second on Amazon’s industrial cloud infrastructure.

In a similar effort elsewhere, Seoul has already trialed commercial insurance payments on a blockchain for the city’s residents.

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