Guide to GOV.UK Notify set up

Step 1: Create an account

1. Visit the GOV.UK Notify website and create an account by providing the necessary information. You’ll need a public sector email address and the name of the person who will manage the account.

2. After creating an account, you will need to verify your identity. Follow the instructions provided to complete this process.

Step 2: Set up your service and templates

1. Create a service: Select ‘add a new service’. Give the service a name and description. For example, ‘Southwark BOPS’.

2. Invite team members: Navigate to the ‘Team members’ page to invite colleagues to Notify. Select ‘Invite a team member’ and enter their email address and the permissions you want them to have.

3. Add a reply-to email address: You need to provide an email address that applicant queries can be directed to. Navigate to the ‘Settings’ page. Under the ‘Email settings’ heading, select to ‘Manage’ the reply-to email addresses on your account. Select to ‘Add reply-to email address’ and enter the email address you want to use. This will create an ID code to copy into BOPS. Note that if you only have one email listed, then there will not be an ID code, because this email will automatically default to your reply-to-email address.

4. Login to your BOPS admin account and navigate to the settings tab. Select to edit your profile. Paste this ID into the ‘Reply-to email address ID’ field and save.

5. Set up templates: Templates define the content and structure of the letters and emails you send. In GOV.UK Notify, you’ll need to create and customise templates for SMS, letters, and emails. Find out how to set up templates in Notify. This will create template IDs to copy into BOPS.

Step 3: Set up GOV.UK Notify API key and link to your BOPS account

APIs allow different software systems to communicate and interact with each other. You need to link your GOV.UK Notify and BOPS accounts to make sure your emails and letters are sent correctly. To do this:

1. In your GOV.UK Notify account, navigate to ‘API integration’ and select ‘API keys’.

2. Select ‘Create an API key’. Select to create a Live type of key. Give it a name, for example ‘BOPS service key’.

3. You will be shown an API key, which is a long code of numbers and letters. Select ‘Copy API key to clipboard’. It is very important that you copy this code, because once you exit this page you cannot check it again.

4. Login to your BOPS admin account and navigate to the settings tab. Select to edit your profile. Paste the API key into the ‘Notify API key’ field and save.

Step 4: Set up and link your templates to your BOPS account and test them

Set up your templates

Navigate to the ‘Templates’ page.

Email template

1. Select ‘New template’ and choose to create an email template.

2. Give the email template a name, for example ‘BOPS email template’ and enter the subject and message text exactly as shown in the screenshot below. Then, save the template.

Letter template

1. Select ‘New template’ and choose to create a letter template.

2. Give the letter template a name, for example ‘BOPS consultation letter’ and enter the subject and message text exactly as shown in the screenshot below. Then, save the template.

SMS template

1. Select ‘New template’ and choose to create an SMS template.

2. Give the SMS template a name, for example ‘BOPS SMS’ and format the template as shown in the screenshot below. Then, save the template.

Link templates to BOPS

1. Login to your BOPS admin account and navigate to the ‘Settings’ tab. On the left side bar, select ‘Manage GOV.UK Notify’.

2. You need to populate the template ID fields for your email, SMS and letter templates from GOV.UK Notify. To do this, open each template you created on Notify and copy the ‘Template ID’ codes. Paste each code into the relevant template field in BOPS and save.

Test your templates

Before sending notifications to your users, it's important to test them. Use your testing environment to ensure that your notifications are formatted correctly and contain the intended information. Once you're satisfied with the results, you can start sending notifications to your planning service users from your live account.

1. For each template, select ‘send test’.

2. Follow the guidance to enter your email address, SMS, or the address you want to send to. For each test, you will be shown a reference number.

3. Login to GOV.UK Notify and navigate to the dashboard.

You can check the reference number for each test using the search box.

For letters, remember that you will be charged for letters that are sent, even if they are just tests. You can cancel your test letter by opening the ‘letters’ dashboard, opening the test letter, and selecting ‘cancel’.