Hybrid Mail and Outbound Communications
CDS and our partner Publisure offer an integrated multi-channel communications platform for outbound communications, incorporarting hybrid mail, SMS, email, web portal capabilities and print and fulfilment from our secure digital facility in Aylesbury. We integrate with virtually any internal application and help to deliver immediate efficiency and cost savings.
Features
- Hybrid mail automation of desktop, print and post
- Auditability and full audit trail of all outbound communications
- Electronic signatures
- SMS integration
- Secure email - PIN encrypted
- Integrated web portal - print, post, emailm SMS or publish
- Detailed Management Information
- Automatic registration and authentication
- Digitises your physical communications
- Full MailMark integration
Benefits
- Immediate cash savings
- Increased auditability and compliance of outbound communications
- Simple and easy to deploy
- Automatically digitises your outbound documents
- Automates and eliminates manual processes
- Track posted documents via MailMark
- Generates an archive of our outbound integration
- Integrates with your existing multi channel applications
- Provides full MI reporting
Pricing
£1 to £250,000 a licence
Service documents
Request an accessible format
Framework
G-Cloud 11
Service ID
4 6 2 8 4 9 9 5 2 6 0 4 4 4 2
Contact
CDS
Jonathan Astin
Telephone: 07904 570073
Email: jonathan.astin@cds.co.uk
Service scope
- Software add-on or extension
- No
- Cloud deployment model
- Hybrid cloud
- Service constraints
- Then Publisure solution integrates with a range of applications and supports Windows, Citrix and Terminal Services environments and inputs from UNIX environments via 'hot folders' or CUPS integration with the windows print spooler. The solution requires Windows 2012 or above.
- System requirements
-
- Requires Windows 2012 or above
- Can be installed in any windows operating environment
- External firewall changes required if implemented as an outsourced solution
- Unix Integration via CUPS and Samba share
- Local Firewall configurations may be required on the Publisure server
- Supports Delimited datafiles (CSV) or XML inputs
- Supports PDF or Postscript Inputs
- PIF/PAF license required for MailMark
User support
- Email or online ticketing support
- Email or online ticketing
- Support response times
-
Publisure responds to all tickets within 4 hours. Standard support and maintenance is available Monday to Friday between 9.00am and 5.30pm. Extended weekend cover is available as an additional service to the standard Support and Maintenance offering
For full details of response times, please refer to the service definition document. - User can manage status and priority of support tickets
- Yes
- Online ticketing support accessibility
- WCAG 2.1 AA or EN 301 549
- Phone support
- Yes
- Phone support availability
- 9 to 5 (UK time), Monday to Friday
- Web chat support
- No
- Onsite support
- Yes, at extra cost
- Support levels
-
Support is provided via Publisure's Helpdesk to agreed SLAs. Response times vary depending on the severity of the issue and range from
- Severity 1 (30 minutes)
- Severity 2 (60 minutes - 2 days)
- Severity 3 (4 hours - 5 days)
- Severity 4 (4 hours).
SLA Explanation
Severity 1 - is usually when the problem is detrimental to the business and is impacting the business directly as a result of Publisure software . Severity 2 - is usually if a server, network, application, database goes down which is causing a business impact to users and the business. Severity 3 - Where a bug is raised as part of the support process, Publisure support will liaise with the development team and provide a synopsis of the problem within 2 working days and a proposed timescale for its resolution, within a reasonable time frame. Severity 4 - Where issues are caused by non Publisure software or environments, some advice will be given and support offered, but with no guarantee of resolution. - Support available to third parties
- Yes
Onboarding and offboarding
- Getting started
- CDS provides a tailored on-boarding pathway based on your individual requirements. On-boarding is a collaborative process, involving stakeholder interviews and workshops, through which we will ensure we fully understand your functional and technical requirements. This includes process design, workflow, user experience design, template development, data migration, system integration and hosting.
- Service documentation
- Yes
- Documentation formats
- End-of-contract data extraction
-
Publisure provides an open framework for data migration. Data is held in the form of indexed data and associated PDF documents.
On the termination of a contract, the documented Publisure APIs enable the customer to extract all data from the Publisure system. If required Publisure provide consultancy services to help deliver this 'end of life' service. - End-of-contract process
-
Support of the Publisure interfaces and export APIs is provided as part of a valid support and maintenance contract.
Over and above the standard data extraction tools, any additional consultancy services would be charged separately.
Using the service
- Web browser interface
- Yes
- Supported browsers
-
- Internet Explorer 9
- Internet Explorer 10
- Internet Explorer 11
- Microsoft Edge
- Firefox
- Chrome
- Safari 9+
- Opera
- Application to install
- Yes
- Compatible operating systems
- Windows
- Designed for use on mobile devices
- Yes
- Differences between the mobile and desktop service
- Inputs into the system requires the use of a shared windows print device or the ability to drop a PDF into a 'Hot folder'. These requirements may place some limitations on the use of Mobile devices for submission of documents into the system. However, users can access the user interfaces via supported mobile or desktop Browsers .
- Service interface
- Yes
- Description of service interface
- The interfaces are currently undergoing validation and development to meet accessibility standards
- Accessibility standards
- None or don’t know
- Description of accessibility
- Testing with assistive technology is being carried out as part of Publisure's ongoing assessment of compatibility standards
- Accessibility testing
- Testing with assistive technology is being carried out as part of Publisure's ongoing assessment of compatibility standards
- API
- Yes
- What users can and can't do using the API
-
The solution provides APIs for both inputs and outputs.
The basic Publisure API print driver allows any print enabled application to submit documents into the Publisure system. Publisure also provide a number of pre-configured output APIs. For example, integration with other third party Hybrid Mail solutions providing the customer with a non proprietary platform for automating print and post. Publisure provides a simple scripting language which can be used to create many different forms of output - for example, in addition to our own SMS, secure email and Web Portal applications, the powerful scripting language has been used to create integration with many third party products. - API documentation
- Yes
- API documentation formats
- API sandbox or test environment
- Yes
- Customisation available
- Yes
- Description of customisation
- Users have the ability to customise the user interfaces using standard resources such as logos, text and third party integrations. These configurations are managed through a standard configuration interface.
Scaling
- Independence of resources
-
The performance of our cloud based services are continually monitored.
We have a detailed scaling model that allows us to scale up or down based on anticipated demand and pro-actively manage the resources available in the Publisure datacentre. The architecture and topology used in the datacentre ensures we have the ability to add additional hardware and software resources on demand.
Analytics
- Service usage metrics
- Yes
- Metrics types
-
The system provides detailed management information and usage metrics including the name of the originator,workgroup or department, cost centre, recipient, status and delivery method. It also offers a closed loop solution recording how the document was processed, chosen channel and date and time of delivery.
Publisure also provides integrated MailMark capabilities for print and post allowing documents to be tracked through Royal Mail. - Reporting types
-
- API access
- Regular reports
- Reports on request
Resellers
- Supplier type
- Reseller providing extra features and support
- Organisation whose services are being resold
- Publisure
Staff security
- Staff security clearance
- Other security clearance
- Government security clearance
- Up to Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS)
Asset protection
- Knowledge of data storage and processing locations
- Yes
- Data storage and processing locations
- United Kingdom
- User control over data storage and processing locations
- No
- Datacentre security standards
- Managed by a third party
- Penetration testing frequency
- At least once a year
- Penetration testing approach
- ‘IT Health Check’ performed by a Tigerscheme qualified provider or a CREST-approved service provider
- Protecting data at rest
-
- Physical access control, complying with CSA CCM v3.0
- Encryption of all physical media
- Data sanitisation process
- Yes
- Data sanitisation type
- Deleted data can’t be directly accessed
- Equipment disposal approach
- Complying with a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v.30, CAS (Sanitisation) or ISO/IEC 27001
Data importing and exporting
- Data export approach
- A simple set of Publisure reports allow the customer to extract metadata from the database in either CSV or PDF format.
- Data export formats
- CSV
- Data import formats
- CSV
Data-in-transit protection
- Data protection between buyer and supplier networks
-
- Private network or public sector network
- TLS (version 1.2 or above)
- IPsec or TLS VPN gateway
- Data protection within supplier network
-
- TLS (version 1.2 or above)
- IPsec or TLS VPN gateway
Availability and resilience
- Guaranteed availability
-
The cloud option is provided as part of a managed service and benefits from software, support and a secure, fault tolerant (99.95% availability) hosting environment, provided by MemSet (www.memset.com), which is certified to ISO27001.
MemSet use two UK Datacentre located in Reading, Berkshire. Both sites have state-of-the-art facilities, top-quality connectivity and are manned 24/7 with skilled personnel. - Approach to resilience
- This Information is available on request
- Outage reporting
- Alerts are generated by the client software if there is an outage in the datacentre.
Identity and authentication
- User authentication needed
- Yes
- User authentication
-
- 2-factor authentication
- Public key authentication (including by TLS client certificate)
- Dedicated link (for example VPN)
- Username or password
- Access restrictions in management interfaces and support channels
- Where the software is implemented on client side, authentication is managed through the customers Active Directory configurations and Group Policies. If not directly integrated into Active Directory Publisure utilises Username and Password authentication. Passwords have to conform to agreed standards of complexity. Additionally two step authentication can be implemented requiring the additional use of a security PIN Number.
- Access restriction testing frequency
- At least every 6 months
- Management access authentication
-
- 2-factor authentication
- Public key authentication (including by TLS client certificate)
- Dedicated link (for example VPN)
- Username or password
Audit information for users
- Access to user activity audit information
- Users have access to real-time audit information
- How long user audit data is stored for
- User-defined
- Access to supplier activity audit information
- Users contact the support team to get audit information
- How long supplier audit data is stored for
- User-defined
- How long system logs are stored for
- User-defined
Standards and certifications
- ISO/IEC 27001 certification
- No
- ISO 28000:2007 certification
- No
- CSA STAR certification
- No
- PCI certification
- No
- Other security certifications
- No
Security governance
- Named board-level person responsible for service security
- Yes
- Security governance certified
- No
- Security governance approach
- Publisure have implemented a detailed and robust policy on security governance and are in the final stages of gaining ISO27001 accreditation
- Information security policies and processes
- As part of our ISO 27001 accreditation we have detailed and documented information security policies, which cover all aspects of information governace.
Operational security
- Configuration and change management standard
- Supplier-defined controls
- Configuration and change management approach
- All hardware and software changes are tracked in accordance with Publisure's ISO27001 policies. In terms of software development we use a structured change management platform BitBucket. This allows Publisure to incrementally manage the development and evolution of our software platforms at an individual component level. Each time a new version of the software is released it undergoes an internal security audit followed by a full penetration testing exercise.
- Vulnerability management type
- Supplier-defined controls
- Vulnerability management approach
- The Publisure architecture and associated technologies have been designed to minimise any potential threat or external vulnerabilities. Publisure rigorously maintain firewall and anti virus software to ensure the system is always up to date with the latest available configurations We assess potential threats to our service by collating information from a number of different sources - Security partners, Specialised Software partners and Infrastructure Provides to ensure we meet ongoing challenges. Patches are deployed as soon as they have been validated, tested and released.
- Protective monitoring type
- Undisclosed
- Protective monitoring approach
-
Publisure have a policy of continuous improvement and periodically review processes for potential threats. These cover both internal and external services.
Every new version of the software undergoes a full penetration testing exercise before being made available. If a potential threat is identified, the vulnerability is assessed and prioritised . Typically inclidents are responded to within 24 hours. - Incident management type
- Undisclosed
- Incident management approach
- Any problem identified by the customer is logged with the Publisure Help Desk. The Help desk raises a support ticket and provide an incident number. Publisure agree the Incident severity and engage with the customer to reach a resolution within agreed SLA's. For serious incidents, a specific incident report is raised and a thorough review of the incident is undertaken to identify the cause and resolution. These findings together with any additional recommendations are documented and agreed with the customer.
Secure development
- Approach to secure software development best practice
- Independent review of processes (for example CESG CPA Build Standard, ISO/IEC 27034, ISO/IEC 27001 or CSA CCM v3.0)
Public sector networks
- Connection to public sector networks
- Yes
- Connected networks
- NHS Network (N3)
Pricing
- Price
- £1 to £250,000 a licence
- Discount for educational organisations
- No
- Free trial available
- No