Business e-services special edition - Land Registry

Land Registry
Business e-services
August 2011
1

Contents
Key benefits 3
Latest enhancements:
official copies service 4
Network Services 5
Coming soon:
e-document registration
service 6
Information Services 7
E-services training 8
Free reporting tools 9
“The portal gives
us an edge over our
competition.”
Adam Fletcher
Partner, Head of Business
Development, Ridley & Hall LLP
Before I discovered the Land
Registry portal, I used a thirdparty
organisation to obtain land
registration information. I was
introduced to the portal shortly
before I joined Ridley & Hall LLP
in 2008. The portal allowed me to
access the registration information
I needed faster, more efficiently,
and cheaper than the third-party
organisation. I also knew I was
receiving the information directly
from the source, removing any
possibility of errors.
Since experiencing the portal, I
have never looked back. When
I joined Ridley & Hall LLP, I
advocated the power of the Land
Registry portal. Within a few
hours’ use, my new colleagues
could see the clear benefits of the
portal and we signed up.
The speed and cost benefits of
the portal are delivered straight to
our clients. The portal allows us to
give our clients more competitive
quotes as we can buy registration
information at cost value. It also
allows us to be confident with
the swift turnaround times that
we offer our clients. We feature
the portal in presentations to
potential clients as we feel it gives
us an edge over our competition.
I have been consulted on the
development of the Land Registry
portal. Land Registry listened to
me and other customers, and it
has updated the portal to give
customers what they asked for
– efficient information services
and workflows that are tailored to
meet the needs of my sector.
This magazine is also available
in HTML format. It can be made
available in alternative formats
on request. If you require an
alternative format, please contact
Customer Support by email or on
0844 892 1111.
Business e-services is a special
issue of Landnet, Land Registry’s
customer magazine. You can
read past issues of Landnet in our
online archive.
To receive a bulletin every time
Landnet is published, please send
your name, job title and email
address to the Editor, Gavin Curry,
at gavin.curry@landregistry.gsi.
gov.uk
Designed by Peter Sim; published
by Land Registry, Head Office, Trafalgar House,
1 Bedford Park, Croydon CR0 2AQ
© Crown copyright 2011 Land Registry
2

Business e-services
Key benefits of
Business e-services
— Speed, certainty and
accuracy.
— No more postal delays.
— Savings in time, money
and resources.
— Reduced environmental
impact.
— An electronic audit
trail that helps prevent
fraud.
Our Business e-services have
gone from strength to strength
since their launch in 2008.
There are now 12,991
organisations and 189,812
registered users with access
to the services via the Land
Registry portal.
An important element of our
Business e-services’ success
is listening to you. A number
of key enhancements have
been made as a direct result of
customer feedback, including the
electronic delivery of PDF files
when transactions are completed
and extending their availability
to 15 days.
This collaborative style of
working has resulted in high
levels of customer satisfaction.
In our recent customer survey,
95 per cent of respondents
rated the Land Registry portal
as good, very good or excellent,
with 35 per cent describing it as
excellent.
We will continue to work closely
with you to make further
improvements. For example,
we recently held workshops
with customers to look at
proposed enhancements to
official copy applications. The
participants were able to directly
influence the look and feel of the
enhancements.
We will be consulting widely
with customers over the next
12 months. If you have any
ideas, comments or suggestions
for Business e-services
enhancements, please contact
Customer Support by email or on
0844 892 1111.
3

Monday 5 September: we’re improving
our official copies service
Larger file sizes
available to download
More information on which
documents are available
Fewer clicks to make an
order
More than 160,000 Business
e-services users download official
copies, reflecting your need for
immediate electronic delivery of
vital documents.
We’re now improving the service.
From Monday 5 September you’ll
be able to download documents
scanned at a size larger than A3
– other than title plans – and PDF
files of up to 10 megabytes.
The ordering process has been
simplified and the information we
provide has been enhanced.
——
The request screen will tell you
whether the documents you
want are available for electronic
download and whether they
can be sent immediately.
——
You’ll be able to order registers
and title plans without a list of
the other documents available
appearing.
——
The relevant register entry
number will appear against
each document displayed.
——
The option to select postal
delivery has been phased out,
as post is chosen in less than
1 per cent of electronically
submitted requests.
The changes have been
extensively researched and tested.
Forty customers ranging from high
to low-volume users were asked
how we could improve the service.
They marked the existing service
at 8 out of 10, a rating we hope will
rise after 5 September.
We also invited customers to
help develop the new features,
from viewing mock-up screens
to hands-on testing. Annette
Dobbins of Wragge & Co and Sarah
Adams and Allison Livingstone of
Mills & Reeve visited our Coventry
Office to give the enhancements
a thorough examination before
declaring themselves happy with
the changes.
“It’s a lot nicer and easier to use,”
said Sarah, with the trio agreeing
that the number of screens, and
the amount of information they
carried, made the official copies
process more easily navigable.
A means of downloading large
format title plans is currently being
explored.
Land Registry Product Manager
Angela Jackson said more
improvements were on their
way, such as providing an opt-in
notification service for customers
who’d like to be informed when
documents are made available for
download.
“Research and development for
an opt-in notification service is
progressing for launch next year,”
said Angela.
Operational Manager Natalia
Guandin said customers had
also been telling us that some
important documents, such as
those that facilitate enquiries
before contract, were not always
available to download.
“To address this customer need
additional solutions, such as
a scan-on-demand service for
customers, are being explored,”
said Natalia.
The changes launched on 5
September will be evaluated with
customers in October.
4

Network Services
Many of our customers are taking
a closer look at the range of
applications available through
Network Services, with 2,600
organisations now able to access
them.
Customers tell us they find the
services fast, easy to use and
straightforward to audit.
Network Services offer a range of
electronic options for customers,
such as the automated, electronic
lodgement of applications to
change proprietors’ names (by
marriage/deed poll/registration of
civil partnership) and to remove
the name of a deceased joint
proprietor from the register. Users
can certify these changes without
sending certificates, increasing the
speed that the register is updated.
Network Services offer the fastest
possible way to place, cancel and
withdraw restrictions and to enter,
remove and cancel unilateral
notices.
Network Services allow the
electronic lodgement of:
——
e-AN1: electronic application
to enter an agreed notice
——
e-CCD: electronic application
to cancel a caution against
dealing
——
e-CN1: application to cancel
a notice (other than unilateral
notice)
——
e-COA: application for change
of address
——
e-CON: application for
registration of change of
name by marriage/deed
poll/registration of civil
partnership*
——
e-CPD: application for change
of property description
——
e-CSF: electronic charge in
standard form
——
e-CSF: find document
——
e-CST: statutory charge
(applies to Legal Services
Commission applications
only)*
——
e-DJP: application to remove
from the register the name of a
deceased joint proprietor*
— e-HR1: application for registration
of a notice of home rights
——
e-HR4: application to cancel an
existing HR notice
——
e-RX1: electronic application to
enter a restriction
——
e-RX3: electronic application
to cancel a restriction
——
e-RX4: electronic application to
withdraw a restriction
——
e-UN1: electronic application
to enter a unilateral notice
——
e-UN2: electronic application
for the removal of a unilateral
notice
——
e-UN4: electronic application
for the cancellation of a
unilateral notice
——
e-WCT: electronic application
to withdraw a caution.
*Automated registration.
Certain limitations apply –
please see the explanation in
Notice 13.
Three of the services are fully
automated and the others are
processed by Land Registry
staff. If you work with one of
our customer teams, your
applications will be sent direct to
your team.
Completed applications are
returned electronically to the user’s
PDF download folder, where they
can be accessed for 15 days.
To find out more about Network
Services or apply to add them to
your existing Business e-services,
please contact Customer Support
at customersupport@landregistry.
gsi.gov.uk or on on 0844 892
1111.
5

Coming soon: a new e-document
registration service
As part of our commitment to
improving our services, we are
developing a new e-document
registration service in response to
customer feedback.
A successful ‘proof of concept’ period
ended in April and this autumn a
prototype will be trialled with a range
of selected customers. The findings
will inform the pilot of the system.
During this time selected Land
Registry customer teams will also trial
the changes required to our internal
processes. With these checks and
measures in place we plan to roll out
an easy-to-use, robust and secure
service.
——
The service will build on the
e-lodgement and e-delivery
application types already
available.
——
It will allow you to securely lodge
a suite of applications that are
currently submitted through
paper–based systems.
——
The service will allow substantive
registration applications and
transaction types (form AP1
and scanned versions of
accompanying documents) to
be submitted by a signed-up
conveyancer organisation with
legally qualified supervision,
via a choice of secure electronic
channels.
——
Applications to register transfers
and/or charges affecting the
whole of a registered title will be
included in the pilot.
How will the service be
made available?
It will be available via the Land
Registry portal and Business
Gateway.
When will the service be
available?
The planned launch date is early
2012.
How will I know when
this service becomes
available?
You will be notified when this
service becomes available.
6

Information Services
Business e-services users make
an average of 940,000 Information
Services applications a month.
Official copies of registers and
title plans are top of the electronic
delivery charts with 96.5 per cent
of these requests now delivered
electronically.
Listening to you and incorporating
your feedback has also seen the
use of search of the index map
(SIM) and search of part increase
steadily.
Early feedback told us you would
like to be able to upload plans to
support SIM and search of part
applications, so in October 2009
we added the ability to upload
plans up to a file size of 500KB.
This proved so popular that in April
2010 we increased the file size of
plan attachments to 1MB.
Prior to the launch of the attached
plan feature, 28.3 per cent of SIMs
were delivered through e-channels.
The number of SIM applications
lodged through the portal overtook
those lodged in paper format for
the first time in December 2010. In
February this year portal search of
part applications did the same.
Of the 345,930 SIM applications
we received in the first quarter
of this year, 63.5 per cent were
submitted electronically. The trend
has continued through the year.
As one customer puts it: “It
is in essence a very simple,
comparatively low cost service that
generally works very efficiently.”
Official search of part applications
(April to June 2011)
Search of the index map applications: % e-delivered
June 2011
March 2010
Search of the index map
applications (April to June 2011)
Paper 45% Paper 43%
Electronic 55% Electronic 57%
October 2009
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70%
7

Learn how to use
our e-services
E-services users can find a wealth of training material on
our website.
The Education and training pages offer more than 40
modules.
They cover Network Services, Information Services, Land
Charges Services, Lender Services and administrative
tasks associated with Business e-services such as
logging in, creating users and viewing accounts.
First-time visitors to the pages can find a guide on how
to use the modules.
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Keeping track
You can keep track of how your organisation uses our Business
e-services by taking advantage of our free online reporting tools,
aiding supervision and business analysis. Access depends on your
role type.
Administrator report
(available within Administrative Services signpost)
Daily reports are available for 31 calendar days, showing actions taken on certain
accounts by users with a Responsible Person, Deputy Responsible Person,
Business Unit Administrator or Land Registry Business Administrator role.
Variable direct debit online statements
(available within Administrative Services signpost)
View online variable direct debit statements for up to three months. The
statements include transaction types and references. User IDs of the users
submitting the transactions are also displayed for the majority of transaction
types.
Services requested
(available within General Facilities signpost)
View Business e-services transactions submitted in the last seven days.
Services requested reports include date and time of submission of transaction,
transaction type, reference and user name of the person submitting the
transaction. The expected fee for each transaction submitted, to be included in
a later variable direct debit (VDD) notification and online VDD statement, is also
displayed where this fee is known at the time of submission of the request.
Search and view accounts
(available within Administrative Services signpost)
Search and view details of Business e-services authorised users and other
account roles allocated within your business.
Responsible
Person role
Deputy
Responsible
Person role
Business Unit
Administrator
role
Authorised
User role
Financial
Administrator
role
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