11 April 2005

Scottish rate payers can now access information on council tax banding and the newly announced rateable values for non-domestic properties via an enhanced web portal provided by The Scottish Assessors Association, the body responsible for valuation for rating throughout Scotland.

Working with the 14 regional assessors responsible for the valuation function for all 32 Scottish Councils, Connect Internet Solutions developed a national online database of over 2.3 million domestic and nearly 300,000 non-domestic properties in Scotland, as part of the ‘’Definitive National Addressing for Scotland Programme’’.

The portal provides a single point of access to national information on council tax banding and rateable values for the public and the property sector. Following their official release on 1st April 2005, the new rateable values for 2005/2006, as well as the old values, are available on the latest version of the site. In the near future, the Scotland wide online resource will also allow the public to download forms for rating appeals. The scheme is funded by the Scottish Executive’s Modernising Government Fund.

Scottish Executive Minister for Finance and Public Service Reform, Tom McCabe, commented, “Improving the delivery of public services is a top priority for the Executive. Delivering services in the way people want is one important way of doing this - and that is why this project is so welcome.

“It provides online information and services to ensure more customers will have their service request dealt with at the first point of contact, with the minimum of staff intervention. This provides a consistent and high quality service and it is encouraging to see technology put to such good use.”

Ken Scott, Senior Responsible Officer for Scottish Assessors’ Portal, said: “We are delighted with the positive response to the portal. The site has received widespread praise, which serves to highlight Connect’s technical expertise and design know- how. For the first time the public can access one site for information on property from Lerwick to Berwick.”

Carole Boardman, Public Sector Director of Connect Internet Solutions Limited, comments “Delivering the portal on time and within budget once again demonstrates Connect’s expertise in providing large-scale, national projects. We are delighted to be involved in this project which will form a cornerstone of the Scottish Executive’s Modernising Government and Digital Inclusion agendas, putting individuals at the forefront of public service delivery.

‘’The portal is also valuable in supporting the Scottish Executive’s efficiency drive. According to the April edition of Open Scotland’s newsletter, ‘Customer First’, £40,000 has already been saved by the ability to download information from the Assessors' Portal, as well as between two and three employee months of resources which can be utilised elsewhere.’’

The portal is now also the central source of property information for the Scottish Executive, central government, local authorities and other public bodies. Information is presented in an up-to-date and consistent format through design and implementation of standard identifiers, addressing and coding. This uses existing national address standards (i.e. BS7666) and interim and emerging standards, as appropriate.

The Connect Internet Solutions application incorporates: a method for drawing data from regional databases to populate the portal, a content management system (Connect CMS) to enable web-based creation, maintenance and management of content (e.g. forms, FAQs, news etc) and a system for delivery of content to assessors, government, citizens and other key stakeholders.