The Department of Human Services delivers 304 million health and welfare outbound payment transactions with a total value in excess of $100 billion each year. The major agencies in the DHS umbrella are Centrelink, Medicare and the Child Support Agency.This is equal to almost 20 per cent of the payments, by number, processed across the slow but reliable direct entry system for payments operated by banks. By value, the relatively low value payments originating from the government are less than two per cent of payments, given the use of direct entry for payroll, business and personal transfers (including practically all payments originated through internet banking services). A total 6.6 billion transactions against customer records are made each year through Centrelink; and 280 million health services each year are processed by Medicare Australia.Some of the fifty-odd submissions are little more than quick overviews of the capabilities of particular companies and potential vendors.PayPal notes that the internet is now the most common channel for people to deal with the government and are clearly pitching for acceptance by government of PayPal as a method of payment.One of the more interesting submissions is from Accenture, who highlight the issue of the difficulties around achieving a single centralised record of clients or customers. They, along with other vendors, are selling CRM tools that attempt to create a one-stop shop for customer ID management and service delivery.Accenture can also point to recent work sorting out some of the myriad projects for system improvement required by the Australian Taxation Office, including helping to steer the savings scheme for first home owners into operational life.Banks and other vendors raise questions about government using the "know your customer" processes of organisations in the financial sector to recognise the customer, and want indemnity from problems that could arise.Pre-paid card vendors are lining up to provide an emergency payments solution that can work in the aftermath of natural disasters. This seems one part of the project that can be moved forward quickly.