October 2023

(Product Area: Aptem Apprentice)

We have added the ability to claim LSF when processing a Return to Learning process automation tracker. This will be optional. Customers will need to provide a from and to date for their LSF claim. This will give our customers the convenience of adding this without needing to manually. This will also give our customers ownership and visibility over when to claim this funding.

(Product Area: Aptem Skills)

We have added the following Devolved Area Monitoring codes:

• 70 - WECA Primary Green Skills
• 70 - WECA Secondary Green Skills
• 72 - 19-23 Fully funded level 2

(Product Areas: Aptem Apprentice, Aptem Skills)

As part of the changes needed for the new funding year 23/24, we have enabled the 23/24 Privacy Statement on the ILR onboarding wizard. Previously viewed Privacy Statements will be viewable in previously completed Onboarding Wizards.

At Aptem, we aim to offer our users an accessible product that meets the latest WCAG AA Standards. We are committed to improving accessibility, including updating styles for interactive elements like buttons and links. In this release, a number of Accessibility improvements were made, For more information, see: Accessibility improvements - October 2023.

• Skills Bootcamp funding model (37) and programme type (32) will now correctly apply the corresponding programme type or funding model to the ILR when applying a programme where they have been configured in the ILR token.
• The Message Centre functionality in Classic and Console was updated to ensure that the conversation is recorded only after the first message/notification gets sent between contacts. Opening conversation with a contact without any further interactions no longer results in an empty conversation being incorrectly stored and then displayed to both participants, often confusing learners who had no actual contact history with particular tutors. Additionally, contacts who do not have access to Message Centre and with whom no messages/notifications were exchanged in the past are no longer displayed in the Contacts list in Classic and Console. Previously they would appear as blank conversations with no option to send a message, and no history being displayed.
  Existing empty conversation are scheduled to be removed separately, as a follow-up procedure to the release of the fix.
• In some cases, an extra criteria was causing the national insurance number to not be mandatory even though this was set in the programme. We have rectified this and the NINo will be mandatory when it is set to be so in the programme.
• Documents uploaded to the Organisations document section could not be deleted, we have rectified this and restored this functionality.

• All pages within the Funding dashboard have had the following applied:

  • The font has been updated to a standard size.

  • All wording has been updated to only capitalise first words or proper nouns.

  • Filters have been consistently placed on the left.

To improve the accessibility of the MFA system for learners and employers who are unable to use the authenticator app, Aptem will allow users to choose between two authentication methods: the authenticator app or email as their preferred authentication method.

In order to give customers greater reporting and forecasting abilities with regards to the Reviews functionality, we will surface the following sections, including their responses via a new OData feed:

• Custom
• Core Topics
• EPA Gateway
• Individual Support Needs/ Requirements
• Short and Long Term Goals
• Comments
• RAG

This will ensure parity with the Classic review export functionality.

Where configured at the programme level, administrators will be able to make amendments to the 'Learning Declaration' section. They can enter their own text on the ILR declaration, and can add logos to the header. The ILR declaration will be generated with the new text and logos in a read-only state for the learner, who can then view/sign the ILR declaration.

We're updating the Accountability Framework within the Quality Power BI reporting dashboard to allow users to filter on the current year and previous year.