The Refugee Information Processing System (RIPS) is a refugee case management system for non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and law firms who provide legal aid to refugees. RIPS has been extended to cater for other legal services, such as education services and advice centres.
It is a free cloud-based system to standardise and secure refugee case management. RIPS increases the effectiveness of data organisation and can be adapted to the specific needs of the user.
The software has been used by law firms and NGOs to manage more than 500,000 refugee cases in the UK, Ecuador, Egypt, Malaysia, Mexico, Tanzania and Thailand.
RIPS has been designed and developed by UK software company Applied Network Solutions, a leader in bespoke case management software systems.
RIPS enables caseworkers to efficiently register details of each engagement with a client, track and review relevant information and easily hand over cases to other colleagues or restrict it to particular staff members.
The case management system provides a robust and secure method of storing client information – without endless paper trails and hard copy files cluttering up the office and possibly going astray – or, worse, being stolen.
All information is both stored on-premises and off-site – eliminating the threat of natural and manmade loss of data. Off-site data is managed by Applied Network Solutions’ experienced IT experts in the UK, while confidentiality of subscriber is maintained.
Applied Network Solutions retains the information online in its database, but every day it backs up the data to a removable external hard disc. This means that if the live database were to get wiped out by ransomware, for example, Applied Network Solutions can restore the data from a disc, which will not have been touched by the ransomware attack.
If required, access to sensitive information can be restricted to the lead caseworker/programme manager, to ensure the highest level of data protection.
In addition, the system enables caseworkers to generate their own reports related to the organisation's specific requirements – including key metrics for management, and case notes/schedules for caseworkers.
RIPS case management system was originally developed by software company Applied Network Solutions for the UK government in 1995, who needed an efficient tool for processing refugees. (More on RIPS history here).
Since RIPS was first developed in 1995, head of Applied Network Solutions, David Johnston, and the team have been continually adapting the software to suit users’ increasingly complex needs.
As David explains: “RIPS became a robust tool because it was being used by over 250 caseworkers on a daily basis for more than ten years. The caseworkers fed back their suggestions for improving RIPS to the managers on a regular basis that led to system tuning and enhancements. RIPS was upgraded every three months based on this feedback.“
The result is a responsive, flexible and robust case management system.