Available for testing on pre-live sites in the UK and Ireland on January 25, then going live on January 28. Released in the US on February 2.
 

CaseViewer

Improvement

• On Admin pages, the loading message has been updated to match Granicus standard messaging.

 

Customer Portal (Self)

Improvements

• Improved privacy for internal users who publish services to the Customer Portal.
• Improved the accessibility of the modal that allows users to select the results of a lookup. The modal is now accessible using keyboard only.
• The default footer for the Customer Portal will now include a link to the govService Privacy Policy, to ensure transparency as required by GDPR. Clients may edit the footer as required to match their branding, but we recommend that the client's Privacy Notices includes information from Granicus' Privacy Notice, or a link to the policy. Per GDPR, clients are required to display a privacy notice. The revised footer is shown as the default footer at: /admin/self/Content/PageComponents#General.

Bug Fixes

• The default color of buttons within the Customer Portal has been updated to meet WCAG AA accessibility contrast guidelines.
• When custom CSS was in-use, the most recently released Cookie message was appearing multiple times when users visited the platform's login pages. We have fixed it so that the Cookie Notice only appears once.

Customer Service Hub (Service)

Improvement

• Email address is now a unique field when creating a new customer account within Customer service Hub (Service). This means that it will no longer be possible to create a new account using an email address already associated with another account. The impact of this change will be a reduction in the number of duplicated accounts within Customer Service Hub.

govService Platform

Improvements

• Background software updates have been made to keep our platform up-to-date.

Bug Fix

• Removed the Back button from Capita due to incorrect behavior.
• Currently, an error message appears when a user submits a request to change their email address or password. With this release we have patched the error, meaning that users can once again submit requests to change their password and email addresses.

MyRequests

Improvement

• MyRequests v3 has been updated in preparation for a future software update. This change will have no effect on functionality.

Additional Notes

Platform Changes 

Included with the release are routing and scaling changes, which will not have any visible impact on your environments, and are noted for information only.

V1 Integrations

We are currently reviewing the use of V1 integrations within the Platform, and would ask Customers to check which processes are set to use V1 integrations with a view to moving them to V2 integrations. Many of the initial blockers to moving to V2 integrations have now been resolved and there are benefits to moving over to V2.  Further information on V2 integrations

Reminder

We will be completing essential maintenance work on our UK/Ireland platform on January 26th 2021, from 9PM - 1 AM GMT. During this maintenance window all sites will be offline. This means your govService sites will not function. You may wish to disable any monitoring or batch processing which depend on our services. We thank you for your understanding.

FAQs relating to this work:

What is the maintenance for? 

We are upgrading servers to the latest stable version. This work will ensure that our database tier is as healthy as possible enabling a more stable and performant service and leading to better user experience for all citizens. 

Why can’t the changes be applied as part of the normal release cycles? 

• This is not a software release and as with all significant changes, we always aim to keep them separate from other software changes. 

Will it impact any of the services once the solution is brought back online? 

• We do not expect any impact to current services.

What will be displayed to the citizen when the solution is offline? 

• The entire platform will be offline, so no need to take any action. Citizens will be directed to a generic downtime page. 

Are there any testing requirements following the work? 

• There are none, however if you usually run a specific test after our fortnightly releases, feel free to run them after this change.

What support is in place for any issues encountered following the maintenance?

• Our support team will be available as usual. 

How often will these windows of maintenance happen moving forward? is there a schedule? 

• There is no specific schedule at this point in time, we realize that this can be a massive inconvenience for our customers, which is always at the forefront of our minds.