Template maintenance

Document templates

A user can select a template in the context of an application, worksheet, or other record and use it to produce a letter or other document that is particularised to that record. For example, a letter can be addressed to a named recipient, citing details of their particular application.

Each ASSURE product area has its own document templates. Templates are collected together in predefined document groups. Your authority may find it helpful to define sub-categories of these document groups. To enable data from a record to be added to documents, predefined schemas map fields from database views onto document production merge fields; each schema can include subordinate child schemas.

Usually, only system administrators can maintain templates. But this ability can also be extended to Public Protection authority users with the DP-TEMPLATE-ACCESS security key and Land & Property authority users with permission to use the DP - Letter Templates function.

Note

Document groups, database views, and schemas are predefined by NEC Software Solutions in consultation with our customers.

Template editors

ASSURE supports two ways of creating and editing templates:

NEC Communications Suite

The NEC Communications Suite (NCS) enables templates to be maintained entirely online. NCS includes a customised version of the ONLYOFFICE Document Editor. The Document Editor provides similar formatting capabilities to MS Word. You insert document production merge fields into the template from the Insert Field plugin.

These templates are known as NCS templates.

Every NCS template is based on an NCS Master Template, which defines the basic fonts, document margins, fields, and standard boilerplate text and images that are likely to be used in every document produced by your authority.
Template Maintenance Tool

The Template Maintenance Tool (TMT) works together with Microsoft Word. It is separate from ASSURE but is installed with it. You use the TMT to assemble a template from reusable pieces called template fragments. A template fragment can be used in several different templates. Any change to a fragment affects all of the templates in which it is used. Each template fragment can refer to a schema (and its child schemas) although it does not have to. Typically, each fragment contains standard text and graphics, optionally mixed with appropriate merge fields. A fragment that uses a schema that is linked to a particular document group can be used only by templates within that group.

These templates are known as DP templates or TMT/Word templates.

Your authority may have chosen to use either or both methods.

Template properties

Apart from its product area, document group and name, each template has a number of other properties. Some of these template properties can be overruled by the user who requests a document based on the template (the "requesting user").

Document properties
Template property	Description
Sub-categories	Within a document group, a template can be assigned to one or more sub-categories of that group.
Template description	A description of the sort of document produced by the template.
Alternative language templates	Alternative Welsh-language and bilingual templates may be available, for use if the document's recipients have stated their preferred language.
Sub-tab application type	For an NEC Communications Suite template that includes information taken from custom sub-tabs of an application, worksheet, or other record, the specific type of record. This ensures that the correct merge fields will be available in the Document Editor.
Target response days	Allows the document to include a date, calculated from the day it is produced, by which the recipient is expected is expected to respond. For Building Control, Land Charges and Planning templates, this may exclude non-working days.
Store produced document	By default, each document is stored in the NEC Document Management repository after production. Exceptionally, a document can be omitted from the repository if a saved copy is not required.
Allow editing of produced document	The document is produced as usual but then held in the document queue with a status of Awaiting Edit so that the requesting user can edit it. This applies only to documents that are stored in the NEC Document Management repository.
Allow auto editing of produced document	Similar to the previous property except that ASSURE opens the document for editing automatically. If your authority is using the NEC Communications Suite the document opens in the online Document Editor. Otherwise, it opens in Microsoft Word provided that the requesting user has the NEC DM Enterprise Desktop Integration (EDI) application running on their computer.
Application summary template	The document defined by this template is intended to summarise an entire application or worksheet. Note: Building Control and Planning application summary templates cannot be used by authority users for any other purpose.
Default output method	A document may be emailed, printed, or filed (for example, saved as a PDF). You can specify a default output method (which may be overruled by the requesting user) or always leave it up to the requesting user to select an output method.
Use PMoWC	The document's recipients may have already indicated their preferred method of written contact (PMoWC): either by email or by post. Optionally, the PMoWC can be used to influence the output method: If a recipient's PMoWC is by email, the document is emailed provided that their email address is known. (If a recipient's email address is unknown, the document cannot be sent.) If a recipient's PMoWC is by post, the document is either printed or filed, depending on whether a printer or a location is specified as the output method. If the PMoWC is not used, or is unspecified for a particular recipient, the default or user-selected output method prevails.
Amalgamate letters into a single file	Allows multiple documents to be produced and then amalgamated into a single file. This feature is available only for an NCS template.
GL payment letter	Whether this template can be used when making an authorised payment to an applicant or payee involved in a Grant and Loan application. Before producing the letter, ASSURE prompts for the payment details and records them in the GL worksheet.
Schedule of works	Whether this template can be used to summarise the schedules associated with a particular payee involved in a Grant and Loan application (including those schedules that are not associated with any payee).
Letter template type	One or more letter template types: Standard Reply Batch This ensures, for example, that when an authority user requests a reply letter, only Reply letter templates are available for selection.
Document type	The document type by which the document will be indexed in the NEC Document Management repository.
Recipient type	Identifies which category of person, associated with the data presented in the document, is to be its recipient. The list of possible recipient types depends on the document group.
Lock recipient type	For Building Control and Planning templates only, whether the recipient type cannot be changed by the requesting user.
Action code	For Public Protection templates only, this is an action that is added to an associated worksheet's Actions tab when the document is produced.
Email introduction	The introductory content and attachments of the email that is sent by document production when the output method is Email. You can lock this content so that it cannot be changed by the requesting user. For an NCS template, you can also specify whether the document is to be formatted as part of the email itself, rather than as a PDF attachment to it. Note: The default contents are defined by the DocumentProductionSettingsForEmailOutputBC, DocumentProductionSettingsForEmailOutputPL, and DocumentProductionSettingsForEmailOutputPP parameter groups in Configuration Settings.
Authorise before sending	The document is produced as usual but then held in the document queue with a status of Awaiting Authorisation until it has been previewed, possibly edited, and then either approved or rejected, by any one of up to 50 authorising users identified in the document's template.
Manual release and delay sending	Emailed and printed documents can be held indefinitely in the document queue until a user manually releases them. Alternatively, or in addition, emailed documents can held temporarily for a specified period before being sent.