Shared Services Made Easy With Aligned Assets

With a dramatic increase in the number of shared services in local government, gazetteer specialists Aligned Assets have released a shared service version of their award winning gazetteer management system, Symphony iManage.

Designed to allow local authorities to easily manage multiple gazetteers through the same, user-friendly interface, Symphony iManage for shared services respects the GeoPlace requirement to retain separate gazetteer databases, but provides the convenience of working as though they were one.

In addition to Symphony iManage, their Street Naming and Numbering module now also comes complete with a shared service option to allow any street naming and numbering officer to move seamlessly between cases, irrespective of which authority they come from.

The Aligned Assets pricing structure for shared services has also been modified to better represent the economies of scale that shared services are intended to achieve. The pricing is no longer a flat fee per authority, but instead reflects the number of authorities involved and joint contracts or procurement.

“Everything we do at Aligned Assets is focused on providing solutions that people want and delivering them in ways that make them cost effective,” explained Managing Director of Aligned Assets, Andy Hird.

“There are already a number of local authorities benefiting from our shared service solutions, not only from the greater efficiencies created through the software, but also cost savings through the new pricing model.”

To find out more, visit www.aligned-assets.co.uk

ABOUT ALIGNED ASSETS
Aligned Assets are an industry leader in AddressBase, gazetteer and address management solutions. They supply software across the public and private sectors including over 100 Local Authorities, Fire & Rescue Services and Police Forces. In addition to software and data solutions, they offer a complete range of consultancy, training, bespoke development and project management.

Law of Street Naming and Numbering Course Announced by Aligned Assets

Woking, Surrey 3rd December 2012 – Gazetteer Specialists Aligned Assets are pleased to announce the next date for their ever-popular ‘Law of Street Naming and Numbering’ training course. The only course of its kind in the UK, it will be held at Conway Hall in London on Tuesday 29th January 2013 and will be instructed by James Richardson, a trained solicitor with over twenty years of local authority experience. Street naming and numbering is an essential component of local government, playing a crucial role in everything from the collection of council tax through to waste and recycling. The laws governing the street naming and numbering process date back to 1847 and in order for the process to operate correctly and within the confines of the law, understanding the legalities involved is of the utmost importance. The course will examine the various laws such as The Towns Improvement Clauses Act 1847, The Public Health Act 1925, The London Building Acts Amendment Act 1939 and The Local Government Act 1972. In addition to specific legislation, the course will also look at the investigation and prosecution of cases, the role of the Local Government Ombudsman and to which elements of street naming and numbering a charge can be applied. Speaking of the upcoming course, Managing Director of Aligned Assets, Andy Hird said, “This will be the fifth time we’ve run the Law of Street Naming and Numbering training course and we’re proud to say that to date there is a 100% record of attendees rating it either Very Good or Excellent.” “At a time when progressively more councils are looking to charge for street naming and numbering services, it is absolutely critical that the law is understood and it is this course that can provide that knowledge.” To find out more, visit www.aligned-assets.co.uk/events ABOUT ALIGNED ASSETS Aligned Assets are an industry leader in AddressBase, gazetteer and address management solutions. They supply software across the public and private sectors including over 100 Local Authorities, Fire & Rescue Services and Police Forces. In addition to software and data solutions, they offer a complete range of consultancy, training, bespoke development and project management.

Aligned Assets Bring Address Point and NLPG Compatibility to AddressBase Premium

With the release of Symphony Bluelight iExchange, gazetteer specialists Aligned Assets can now offer the emergency services a method by which they can automatically convert AddressBase Premium into Address Point and NLPG (National Land and Property Gazetteer) formats.

Designed to allow the emergency services to start working with AddressBase Premium, without the requirement to wait until other systems have been modernised, Symphony Bluelight iExchange will enable a greater level of data integration, efficiency and joined up working.

As a core component of Aligned Assets’ emergency service corporate gazetteer system, Symphony Bluelight iExchange is designed to work alongside the Symphony Bluelight Gazetteer, which enables full management of AddressBase Premium and the creation of local records, plus Symphony SinglePoint, which provides a series of web services for further integration options.

Many emergency services have systems, such as Command & Control, that still run off address data in either the Address Point or NLPG formats, which means they are currently waiting on these systems to be updated before moving to AddressBase Premium. With AddressBase Premium being the most accurate and up-to-date address data currently available, it is important that they can start using it sooner rather than later.

Symphony Bluelight iExchange allows for changes in a corporate AddressBase gazetteer to be automatically converted to Address Point or NLPG and then exported to other systems at set frequencies – daily, weekly, or even hourly if required.

“Symphony Bluelight iExchange will enable emergency services to have one central source of address data and integrate this data into their third party systems,” explained Andy Hird, Managing Director of Aligned Assets.

“Although Symphony Bluelight iExchange is designed to be fully customisable, Address Point and NLPG formats are common amongst the police, ambulance and fire services, which is why we made the decision to have these integration options as standard.”

“By 2014, all users of Address Point or NLPG will be expected to migrate to one of the AddressBase products, but at least now with the release of Symphony Bluelight iExchange, some of the concerns surrounding this migration have been removed.”

To find out more, visit www.aligned-assets.co.uk/bluelight

ABOUT ALIGNED ASSETS
Aligned Assets are an industry leader in AddressBase, gazetteer and address management solutions. They supply software across the public and private sectors including over 100 Local Authorities, Fire & Rescue Services and Police Forces. In addition to software and data solutions, they offer a complete range of consultancy, training, bespoke development and project management.

ABOUT THE ADDRESSBASE PRODUCTS
AddressBase contains Royal Mail PAF® addresses, both commercial and residential matched to the local authority Unique Property Reference Number (UPRN) and structured in a flat file model. You will be able to link additional information about a property to a single address. It also provides further enhancement to the Royal Mail PAF data by assigning an X and Y coordinate to every address, allowing you to place it precisely on a map, together with a summary classification.

AddressBase Plus contains current properties and addresses sourced from local authorities, Ordnance Survey and Royal Mail matched to the UPRN and structured in a flat file model. It has more records than AddressBase as it includes objects without postal addresses such as places of worship and community centres and objects in multiple occupancy buildings. It also enables you to locate an address or property precisely on a map, by cross referencing to the information in OS MasterMap® products via the OS MasterMap Topography Layer and Integrated Transport Network™ (ITN) Layer Topographic Identifiers (TOID®s).

AddressBase Premium provides the most detailed view of an address and its lifecycle. It contains all the AddressBase Plus information and functionalities, such as the ability to cross reference the information with OS MasterMap products via the OS MasterMap Topography Layer and Integrated Transport Network (ITN) Layer Topographic Identifiers (TOIDs).

But the real benefit of this product is that it provides a range of information relating to an address or property from creation to retirement or demolition. It contains local authority, Ordnance Survey and Royal Mail addresses structured in a relational database model. The product is based around the UPRN, the current (approved) addresses; and alternatives for current addresses (reflecting the changes in addresses); provisional addresses (proposed planning developments) and historic information for addresses (including historic alternatives) where available.

The AddressBase products are created by GeoPlace, a public liability partnership between Local Government Association and Ordnance Survey.

Aligned Assets Customers Dominate for Second Year Running at the GeoPlace Exemplar Awards

Woking, Surrey 30th October 2012 – After dominating the 2011 Exemplar Awards, users of the Aligned Assets gazetteer management system have received countless accolades at the 2012 Awards.

At a ceremony in London to recognise outstanding achievement in the use of local authority address and street gazetteer data, Aligned Assets customers won four out of the six major awards, including London Borough of Harrow being announced the winner of the Overall Exemplar Award.

The London Borough of Harrow had earlier in the day won the Integration Award for their innovative project that saw the use of gazetteer data significantly increased across the authority. In a vote by all 320 delegates, it was this project that was considered to have achieved the most in terms of gazetteer usage and so awarded the top prize.

Other victories included Worthing and Adur Councils who won the Best Example of Street Naming and Numbering Policy Implementation Award, Bath and North East Somerset Council who won the Services Award and Inverclyde Council who were Highly Commended in the Scottish Gazetteer Custodian of the Year category.

The London Borough of Enfield was Highly Commended for Street Naming and Numbering Policy and was also recognised as Best in Region for both Address and Street data. In addition to Enfield, Aligned Assets customers won a further six Best in Region Awards and a total of 34 were given Gold Awards for either their address or street updating.

“All of us at Aligned Assets are delighted for those customers whose hard work and dedication over the past twelve months has been formally recognised,” said Managing Director of Aligned Assets Andy Hird. “Although we would acknowledge that having great software helps, it really is down to the people using that software to make the difference.”

The Exemplar Awards took place during the ‘Everything Happens Somewhere Conference’, which was organised by GeoPlace and held on 25th October at Friends House in London.

To find out more, visit www.aligned-assets.co.uk

ABOUT ALIGNED ASSETS
Aligned Assets are an industry leader in AddressBase, gazetteer and address management solutions. They supply software across the public and private sectors including over 100 Local Authorities, Fire & Rescue Services and Police Forces. In addition to software and data solutions, they offer a complete range of consultancy, training, bespoke development and project management.

Aligned Assets Release the Symphony Blackbox

Woking, Surrey 18th September 2012 – Gazetteer specialists Aligned Assets can today announce the release of its latest software product – Symphony Blackbox.

Designed to allow local authorities to easily share their central address databases with other council departments, and in doing so reduce costs and increase efficiency, the Symphony Blackbox can be used by any council, irrespective of which other software systems they have installed.

Aligned Assets are the first UK company to offer this level of integration, which is based on technology already in use by over 50 local authorities.

Up to 100 different council systems use address data and in many cases the creation and management of those addresses are untaken within each department. This expensive duplication of work can result in a multitude of errors as different addresses are entered with different spellings and formatting. These errors inhibit joined up working and can see a reduction in services to the taxpayer.

Each council in Great Britain will maintain a central database of all addresses within their administrative boundaries known as Local Land and Property Gazetteers (England and Wales) or Corporate Address Gazetteers (Scotland). Symphony Blackbox works by allowing changes in these single databases to be automatically exported to other systems, thereby removing both duplication of work and the errors that result from it.

Managing Director of Aligned Assets, Andy Hird, said, “We’ve calculated that the Symphony Blackbox has the potential to save each council tens of thousands of pounds every year.”

“It’s compatible with existing infrastructure, so requires no restructuring or upheaval, and its flexible, intuitive design means that those savings can start to be recognised almost instantly.”

For more information visit: www.aligned-assets.co.uk/blackbox

ABOUT ALIGNED ASSETS
Aligned Assets are an industry leader in AddressBase, gazetteer and address management solutions. They supply software across the public and private sectors including over 100 Local Authorities, Fire & Rescue Services and Police Forces. In addition to software and data solutions, they offer a complete range of consultancy, training, bespoke development and project management.

Aligned Assets Gazetteer Software Helping to Drive Efficiency at the London Borough of Harrow

Gazetteer specialists Aligned Assets are pleased to announce that the London Borough of Harrow has selected the Symphony Suite of gazetteer software for the management of their Local Land and Property Gazetteer (LLPG).

It will see them using the Country’s most advanced gazetteer management system, Symphony iManage, to ensure that all changes to the Borough’s address data, including all new developments, are recorded accurately, efficiently and in accordance with British Standard BS7666.

They have also opted to take Symphony iExchange, which will allow them to automatically export changes in their address data to other council departments and therefore remove the need to maintain multiple address databases.

The use of iExchange will see the council make significant savings through a reduced workload and greater efficiency, and has the added advantage of ensuring all council departments are able to utilise the UPRN (unique property reference number). The UPRN was instrumental in facilitating their 2012 MJ award winning “MyHarrow Account” citizen portal which won the Transformation through I.T category. In addition, the UPRN will also aid in the transition to Individual Electoral Registration (IER) and since it is used across the public sector, will enable better joined up working with the emergency services and NHS.

Speaking of the purchase, Luke Studden, LLPG Custodian at the London Borough of Harrow said, “Aligned Assets have consistently shown themselves to be leading the way in the provision of gazetteer management systems. When we came to review our software, Aligned Assets were able to tick all the boxes in terms of both functionality and price.”

Studden went on to say, “Moving to the new software was a smooth process and it allowed us to build on the work we have done to date. Symphony iManage’s ability to integrate with ESRI technology as well as MapInfo was a distinct advantage as this meant changes to working practice was kept to a minimum. It also enabled integration with the existing deployment of our corporate GIS infrastructure.”

Aligned Assets now supply over 20% of all London Boroughs and Harrow is the latest in an ever-growing list of local authorities who are recognising them as the number one supplier of gazetteer management systems.

Managing Director of Aligned Assets, Andy Hird was quoted as saying, “The hard work and dedication of the staff at Harrow has already seen them win a number of national awards in recognition of their achievements. We look forward to working with them in the future to replicate this success.”

www.aligned-assets.co.uk

Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service Become the Latest to Select Aligned Assets

Symphony Bluelight, the UK’s only AddressBase compatible gazetteer management system is now in use at Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service

Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service has become the latest emergency service to select Symphony Bluelight from Aligned Assets as their corporate gazetteer management system.

As a suite of software solutions designed specifically for use in the emergency services, Symphony Bluelight will give Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service complete management of their address data and allow them to streamline services by linking the diverse systems that support the organisation.

With address data common to most of these systems, Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service are looking to implement AddressBase Premium from the Ordnance Survey as the single, definitive source of address data, selecting Symphony Bluelight as the only gazetteer management system currently capable of supporting it.

Symphony Bluelight will be used to integrate AddressBase Premium with core business systems including risk information, home fire safety checks and ultimately their new command and control system, which is responsible for mobilising emergency response across more than 3,000 square kilometres.

Sophie Ryder, RCC Data Manager at Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service explained that, “As a receiving authority, our gazetteer requirements differ from those that create and maintain the records. Aligned Assets have delivered a product that suits our needs and to a timescale that allows us to plan a smooth migration to AddressBase.”

Managing Director of Aligned Assets, Andy Hird concluded by saying, “The fact that 25% of all English Fire and Rescue Services, as well as the UK’s two largest police forces in terms of area and staff respectively are using Symphony Bluelight for their gazetteer management shows that our approach of consulting and listening to clients about their needs has produced software of the very highest calibre.”

To find out more visit www.aligned-assets.co.uk/bluelight

ABOUT ALIGNED ASSETS
Aligned Assets are an industry leader in gazetteer and address management solutions. They supply software across the public and private sectors including over 100 Local Authorities, Fire & Rescue Services and Police Forces. In addition to software and data solutions, they offer a complete range of consultancy, training, bespoke development and project management.