Manama, Feb. 5 (BNA): As part of continuous government efforts to strengthen and streamline service delivery, the Urban Planning and Development Authority (UPDA) has improved its property freeze and unfreeze services.
UPDA enhances property freeze services, cuts processing times
Government agencies can temporarily restrict a property or group of properties impacted by planning or development projects using the freeze service. In coordination with the appropriate authorities, the unfreeze service allows the removal of these restrictions, allowing property owners to move forward with construction in accordance with approved classifications.
In addition to reducing the amount of paperwork and permissions needed by up to 50%, the updated system has shortened the processing periods for property freeze and unfreeze requests from 15 to four days and 12 to nine days, respectively.
The CEO of UPDA, Ahmed Abdulaziz Al Khayyat, emphasized that these advancements show how cutting-edge digital solutions have been adopted to speed up processes, increase productivity, and improve service quality—all of which save institutions time and effort.
With the help of service guides and service level agreements, the Authority has also translated, published, and documented more than 1,300 government services, 800 of which have been re-engineered across different sectors in response to investor input, mystery shopper reports, and feedback from The National Suggestion and Complaints System (Tawasul). These programs promote Bahrain’s transition to digital government by improving citizen experience, service quality, and procedural efficiency.
