The Guidelines are organized in six parts.

Part A, Assessing and Contributing to the Enabling Environment, addresses various measures to gauge the extent to which the necessary external building blocks are in place.

Part B, Ensuring Institutional Readiness, points to the key capacities enabling social security institutions to work towards extending coverage to difficult-to-cover groups.

Part C, Increasing Awareness and Reaching out to Difficult-to-Cover Groups, highlights the importance of communicating the programme features and the values of social security in a way that is adapted to difficult-to-cover groups.

Part D, Developing a Cost-Effective Registration System, provides guidance on identifying and registering populations who are unfamiliar with such processes.

Part E, Identifying Proper Solutions to Collect Contributions and Improve Compliance, seeks to ensure that the contribution calculation, as well as collection methods and processes, respond to the specific needs and circumstances of difficult-to-cover groups.

Part F, Delivering Services and Benefits in a Timely, Accurate and Effective Way, provides guidance on how social security institutions can effectively provide benefits and services that respond to the specific needs and circumstances of difficult-to-cover groups.

Within each part, specific guidelines are grouped according to how particular elements of the process may be applied. They are presented as follows.

Guideline. The guideline is stated as clearly as possible.

Structure. This is the suggested structure that may support the application of the guideline and facilitate the promotion of the underlying principle. The structure indicates the goals and framework established by the board and management.

Mechanism. There are different ways through which a guideline may be implemented.

The Guidelines also include a self-assessment tool for social security administrations and links to technical references and examples of good practice.