Fully Digitalized Administrative Procedures in the German Legal System

The article analyses the fully digitalized administrative procedures introduced by the reform of the General Administrative Procedures Act (Verwaltungsverfahrensgesetz – VwVfG) of 2017. This act is not an all-encompassing codification since the presence of several administrative procedures in the German legal system is dependent upon two factors: Germany’s federal structure, and its so-called "three columns system" comprising the General Administrative Procedures Act, tax procedure law and social law. However, the legislator is committed to ensuring the uniformity of administrative procedure rules in every code in order to make their interpretation and use easier for administrations and judges. Following changes in tax law, a generalized introduction of robotic measures generated by algorithms was inaugurated in 2017, as it had become clear that mass procedures in tax law administration were particularly suitable for digitization