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Welcome to our November technical note, keeping you informed of progress on the Point of Single Contact (PSC) and guiding you through to implementation on 28th December which is now only 24 working days away!
We have continued to receive positive feedback on the ELMS portal and are pleased to discover that the majority of you are making your way through the task list without too much difficulty.
1. Thank you to the majority of authorities who have been sending in their completed Task Status Reports- please remember that these are vital for us as we begin to plan for the final stages of implementation.
The appropriate Local Authority and Competent Authority forms are available in a spreadsheet format on ELMS portal: http://elmsportal.businesslink.gov.uk/document
Please send all returns to: servicesdirective@bis.gsi.gov.uk with the subject title “Progress Report” and remember not to amend the form but complete as directed as it has been designed specifically to help automate inputting your return into our database.
2. Thank you to all the Councils who have uploaded a spreadsheet so far - this is a key step to compliance and those who have not yet completed this task will need to do so immediately to ensure that their authority’s forms can be hosted on ELMS.
Based on those uploaded so far, please bear the following in mind:
If you have having difficulty using ESD-toolkit to upload your spreadsheet you can contact localdirectgov@communities.gsi.gov.uk to discuss using the Local Directgov admin interface.
3. As part of Task 8 you should have already received “email 1” from a gmail account asking you to verify the names the PSC uses for your authority and also branding information for users of the forms service.
Thank you for the replies sent in so far. There are two main issues with the answers received: some people have not sent the URL going directly to a GIF file as per the specification in the email. Please email elms@businesslink.gsi.gov.uk with the relevant link or the GIF file as an attachment. Secondly, please ensure that you send the colour in the relevant format – your web officer should be able to help. The colour coding must be 24 bit RGB expressed in hexadecimal. This is 6 characters each between 0-9 and A-F, eg: 000000 FFAACC 1A2B3D. Those who have sent in answers that don't follow this rule will be asked to re-send their information in the correct format.
4. English and Welsh Local Authorities should have recently received "email 2" as part of Task 8, which asks about Local Acts. This is considerably larger than “email 1” and must be read as “HTML.” If you have any problems in reading or understanding “email 2” please speak to your in-house IT team about viewing it in “HTML” and reading and replying to it should become much easier.
To note, the fields are set to defaults so please check carefully.
If you have not received “email 1” and/or “email 2” please get in touch as soon as possible on servicesdirective@bis.gsi.gov.uk with the subject title “Request to re-send Emails 1 and 2.”
5. We have started to provide access to the familiarisation environment for Authorities who have completed the necessary tasks. The familiarisation environment will allow you to understand how ELMS works, learn how to configure and localise the system and get an understanding of its functionality. In order to get access to the familiarisation environment, you must have completed tasks 5 and 7, respond to Email 1 from Task 8 and have implemented the payment engine that you will be using on ELMS. For more information on ELMS familiarisation please see http://elmsportal.businesslink.gov.uk/authority/tasks/10.
6. Please note that Authorities using Civica as their selected payment engine can now provide this information by email. You should have received an email from the ELMS team earlier this week outlining the process to be followed. If you are using Civica and have not received the email, the information and guidance on how to do this can be found at the following ELMS page http://elmsportal.businesslink.gov.uk/authority/tasks/11 If you have any questions please email elms@businesslink.gsi.gov.uk.
7. To enable you to enrol your Authority with the Government Gateway Service that allows you to access the ELMS system, you will soon be receiving by post two pieces of information referred to as ‘known facts’. It is essential that you keep them safe as without them you will not be able to access the ELMS system. For security reasons, the letters that you receive will contain minimal detail. The two known facts that you will be receiving are:
When you are enrolling your authority with the Gateway, you should retain this note as well as the pdf guidance issued as an attachment with the note. If you have misplaced this pdf, please contact servicesdirective@bis.gsi.gov.uk to request it.
Once you have enrolled your Authority you will need to enrol the staff that will be using the ELMS system, either as administrators or as operational users. When you create these users, you provide a password and the system generates a user name consisting of a series of digits, e.g. 5391 0029 3573. With this user name and password the user will log in to the ELMS system. Please note that for security reasons, the users that you have created in the Gateway should change their passwords on first log-in. Once you have registered your authority, please notify the ELMS team by emailing elms@businesslink.gsi.gov.uk with the subject ‘ELMS registration confirmation’.
Once you and your users are enrolled on the Gateway, you will be able to access the live ELMS system, once it is live. Your task then will be to set up departments, create operational user accounts on ELMS and configure your formalities.
In the meantime, a familiarisation environment is provided to help you come to grips with the main features of the system – please see http://elmsportal.businesslink.gov.uk/authority/tasks/10 for more details. If you have any questions please contact the ELMS team at elms@businesslink.gsi.gov.uk or visit the ELMS portal at http://elmsportal.businesslink.gov.uk/
8. With regards to payment engines, please note the following about the four payment providers supported on the PSC:
For Civica, Northgate and Capita, new merchant accounts cannot be set up during December (04/12/09 to 04/01/10). This will only be an issue for customers who do not already have existing accounts. Worldpay do not have such a freeze period and so will continue as normal during this period.
Bearing this in mind for the few authorities who have not yet fully procured a merchant account with the relevant supplier, please do so before 4th December to ensure your authority is compliant.
9. Two presentations are available as further training material on ELMS. The first one is a collection of screenshots outlining the applicant's view of the system (Businesslink) and the other one outlines the authority's view (ELMS):
http://elmsportal.businesslink.gov.uk/page/Training+Material
Both presentations contain annotations to explain each stage and it is hoped that this will allow you to get a full view of the system. In particular, you will see that the form is pre-populated where possible and contains the payment information when the authority downloads it. The presentations only cover the "application" side, and demonstrate how the forms are handled: you will see that there is no need for back office integration, and that the e-payment engine is linked to ELMS, not your website, which should make the implementation easier.
We are keen to hear your comments; please use the Community of Practice to discuss.
10. BIS is working with SOCITM with a plan to survey individual authorities’ websites to gauge the quality of information provided. The EU Services Directive requires a minimum amount of information to be made available to service providers (this is sometimes referred to as “Article 7”) and it is important that this is adhered to. For example, it is not acceptable for authorities to submit their homepage or a single licensing page as formality information. Each formality should be itemised and bear the minimum details as outlined in task 14 on ELMS.
11. The website toolkit is available to help you and provide you with a starting sample. We are sorry that the next version of the toolkit is not in line with the previously published schedule, we are taking feedback into account in order to finalise the last version.
12. Regarding website transactions, a number of authorities have told us that they plan to use their own online forms for licence (and other formalities) applications. This approach allows authorities to have full control over the information they require for applications and as it does not involve the use of ELMS forms, allows any e-payment engine provider to be used. However, you should ensure that your online facilities are fully compliant with the Directive. Compliancy details are available on ELMS Portal Application Forms FAQ number 17
The engagement team is contacting authorities to discuss their implementation progress on a regular basis. If you are planning to use your own facilities, please do mention it or inform us by email at servicesdirective@bis.gsi.gov.uk
13. BIS will shortly be running IMI regional events. These events will focus solely on the IMI system and provide new users with an overview of the system including the processes involved in sending and receiving a request.
Events will be free to attend and will be focussed for users who have not previously had an opportunity to log in or use the system. Unfortunately, due to space constraints we can only offer authorities one allocation per event. Initial details are below. If you are interested in attending an event, please inform us who from your authority will be attending and what event at sdimi@bis.gsi.gov.uk
| Date | Location | Time |
| Monday, 23rd November | Leeds (Government Office, Lateral, 8 City Walk) | 10:00-12:30 |
| Monday, 30th November | Belfast (Antrim, Dunsilly Hotel) | 10:00-12:30 |
| Wednesday, 2nd December | Glasgow (Parish Hall, 266 George Street) | 10:00-12:30 |
| Monday, 7th December | London (BIS Conference Centre, 1 Victoria Street) | 10:00-12:30 |
| Tuesday 8th December | Birmingham (Conference Centre, Aston University, Aston Triangle) | 10:00-12:30 |
| TBC | Wales | TBC |
14. In order to ensure that service providers who are operating in more than one EEA state are not causing either serious damage to the environment or a danger to public health or safety an ‘alert mechanism’ facility is being built into the Internal Market Information (IMI) system.
The European Commission expects to have this alert mechanism ready for use by the end of the year. This will enable competent and local authorities who have become aware of a service provider undertaking such dangerous activity, to immediately inform the competent authorities in other EEA states where it is known that the service provider operates. It will enable the competent authorities of relevant EEA states to react quickly, to closely supervise the service provider in question and, if required, take necessary preventative action in compliance with the Directive.
For more information on IMI alerts please see our webpage.
Further details and guidance will be circulated once the alert mechanism has been finalised. In the meantime, please contact sdimi@bis.gsi.gov.uk should you have any queries.
15. The Provision of Services Regulations 2009 to implement the Services Directive have completed the parliamentary process. They were made by the Minister on 11 November, and will come into force on 28 December. (Click here to view the regulations online).
We would recommend that Primary Liaison Points notify their authority's Management Boards (and Members when appropriate). Various documents are listed in the library on the Community of Practice, including template reports by colleagues, as well as risk assessments.
A typical question you may receive as a PLP is "what if we do not comply?" - Answers to this are outlined in our FAQ on ELMS (http://elmsportal.businesslink.gov.uk/faq/22)
16. The EU Services Directive has reached 800 users this week. We would like to thank all contributors for their questions and also for the answers that forum members provide. The Community of Practice is provided essentially for peer support and good practice and a number of users are doing just that: providing examples and accounts of their experience so far. So keep contributing, and again - thank you very much!
17. The EU Services Directive requires that all licence applications, authorisations and administrative procedures applicable to service providers must be processed as quickly as possible and, in any event, within a reasonable time period, which is fixed and made public in advance. When a response to an application does not occur within the time period set (or following an extension), the authorisation will be deemed to have been granted tacitly, unless different arrangements are in place that are justified by an Over Riding Reason of Public Interest (ORRPI).
18. LACORS has produced a spreadsheet that provides councils with a facility to share information about the timescales they intend to apply to the processing of licences and permits for businesses in the service sector. The structure of the spreadsheet provides for national and regional comparisons.
It is not anticipated that all councils will apply the same timescales, due to the unique nature of each local community and varying resource availability, but this approach will help councils be aware of the intentions of others before the Directive comes into force on 28th December 2009. Councils can email timescales they are considering for processing licences to: sarah.feltham@lacors.gov.uk.
The template spreadsheet is available at: http://www.lacors.gov.uk/lacors/ViewDocument.aspx?docID=22693&docType=C
The spreadsheet will be updated weekly on a Friday morning and re-issued on the LACORS website and the EU Services Directive Community of Practice. The first updated spreadsheet will appear on Friday 20th November.
19. All UK Local Authorities and Competent Authorities should by now have returned all screening reporting forms (final deadline 27th October 2009). As we previously explained, we cannot guarantee that any reporting forms that we now receive will be included in our report to the Commission, which could leave the UK open to the risk of infraction, with Local Authorities and Competent Authorities open to court action from any service providers who feel that they have been denied their full rights. So please submit any outstanding forms right away!
We have noticed that we have not received any report forms on the formalities listed below. If you regulate formalities under the local Acts listed below please can you complete a screening reporting form for each of those formalities and send them back to BIS (servicesdirective@bis.gsi.gov.uk) by 5pm Friday 20th November.
Landlord and Tenants Act 1954 Part 2
South Yorkshire Act 1980
London Local Authorities Act 2000
Berkshire Act 1986
County of Cleveland Act 1987
County of Kent Act 1981
Greater London Council (General Powers) Act 1967
Kingston upon Hull Act 1984
Plymouth City Council Act 1987
South Yorkshire Act 1980
Staffordshire Act 1983
West Glamorgan Act 1987
Nottinghamshire County Council Act 1985
County of Cleveland Act 1987
Greater London Council Miscellaneous Provisions Act 1968
Humberside Act 1982
Medway Act 2001
Nottingham City Council Act 2003
South Yorkshire Act 1980
Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1982
20. I hope you find this Technical Note helpful and please remember that you can find more information on the ELMS Portal, our website and the Community of Practice forum. For any queries, please contact us on servicesdirective@bis.gsi.gov.uk.
