ACTnow: Malaysia’s first mobile app to connect communities with 154 local councils nationwide

KUALA LUMPUR, December 16 — Don’t have the time to walk into the local council to lodge a complaint?

Save yourself the inconvenience — all you may now have to do is to snap a photo or record a short video, type in the text in your smartphone and send your complaint to your respective local council.

Given the convenience mobile apps offer, a group of three concerned citizens have joined hands to develop a mobile application to connect people living in Malaysia with 154 local councils nationwide.

The app called ACTnow is the brainchild of founders Melvin Lam, CS Goh and Nick Neng, who spent about a year to fine-tune the approach and develop the app with their own money.

With about two decades of experience as a publisher for a local media group, Lam is spurred on by his passion to assume a bigger role in society to bring forth positive changes in communities that will impact the whole nation.

Meanwhile, Goh is the tech entrepreneur behind the successful Select-TV, currently operating in 11 countries.

Neng comes in as strategist for ACTnow, lending his years of experience as a successful entrepreneur to add value to the app.

Together, they managed to develop the first multilingual app using advanced mobile platform technology to allow community members to make on-the-spot complaints about their neighbourhood issues.

Users can also upload multiple photos and videos as evidence, and with its location identifier feature, the app will direct the complaint to the relevant council for actions to be taken.

The addressed council will then respond with a solution via message on the ACTnow app on a variety of neighbourhood issues such as uncollected rubbish, unhygienic outlets, unlicenced businesses, congestion due to construction works, illegal building structure or improper parking.

The app also allows the users to manage their complaints and receive suggestions from fellow community members to get swift action.

Lam said they wanted ACTnow to function as a social platform for communities to conveniently lodge complaints, give feedback and interact with local council.

Although some local councils have started their own online complaint services, he said there was no online platform to bring all local councils under one roof.

Citing several reports, Lam said he noticed that communities had some negative sentiments towards local councils when it comes to lodging complaints.

“The idea behind initiating such app was to make a positive change in our communities and to empower Malaysians to take control of their community and work closely with local councils.

“We hope the app would help communities take charge and work together with local councils to enhance efficacy for better living conditions,” Lam added.

Available in four languages — Bahasa Malaysia, English, Mandarin and Tamil, the app also has a translation feature that would translate texts from one language to another.

To illuminate fake reports or inappropriate content being published on the app, Lam said an admin team has been set up to monitor every complaints or updates made by the users.

He said content or comments prohibited by the Malaysian law will be filtered and deleted from the app.

“We will also delete irrelevant posts and send a warning to the users who misuse the platform.”

Lam also noted that users can only upload pictures and videos in real-time to avoid any miscommunication or misleading reporting.

“Pre-recorded videos or pictures from the phone gallery can’t be uploaded on the app.”

All registered users will also be able to view and comment on the issues uploaded on the app.

To create an account on ACTnow, Lam said users just need to provide their email address, assuring that all the complaints to the local councils will be made anonymously through ACTnow without revealing the user’s personal data and identity.

“Some people find it stressful to make a complaint mainly because they don’t want to reveal their identity, hence we decided to keep the users’ data anonymous.

The app is now available on both Google Play and App Store for Android and iOS users respectively.