Process for starting to use Parish Online's mail service

Process for starting to use Parish Online's mail service

Overview

Whether you're completely new to Parish Online's mail service, or your council is migrating from Parish Online's first generation mail service, this tutorial will guide you the process.

By the end of this tutorial you will;
  1. Be able to access your gov.uk email through a webmail portal
  2. Optionally have apps installed on your computer and mobile phone to access your gov.uk email

Video



Why the switch?

Parish Online began offering a mail service in 2022. We've been extremely proud of how popular it's become and how it's helped local councils portray a professional exterior to members of the public.

As with all our services, we're constantly looking at the best technology solution for local councils. Our first iteration of our mail service was good, but it had a few limitations, including;
  1. No Two-factor authentication option
  2. A dated-looking webmail experience
  3. Difficult to administer distribution lists
To solve this we've partnered with a company, Zoho, specialising in mail servers so we can lean on their expertise and rate of development to ensure our local council customers get the best experience.

The new service solves the issues identified above, and include a lot more useful functionality for day-to-day parish work. it includes;
  1. Two-factor authentication options
  2. A fresh and modern webmail experience
  3. Easy-to-administer distribution lists
  4. Shared mailboxes
  5. Email aliases
  6. Calendars
  7. Tasks and Notes
  8. Improved Signature management
We also have chargeable upgrade paths for accessing other tools, such as;
  1. Online file storage
  2. Chat and Video messaging
  3. Auditing and FOI data management

Timescale

We are planning to switch off our Version 1 mail service by the 31st August 2024. So all email customers will need to switch over by then.

Method

We will first agree a switchover day with the clerk. On this day your access to emails will stop working. It's at this point where you will need to follow the process below.

1. Accessing the email through the web portal

It's important to do this step first before attempting to add your mailbox to other mail apps. Please do not skip this step!

The clerk will be provided with a temporary password that they will need to share with you before the switchover day. If you have this then you're ready to go!
  1. Go to your new webmail address. This will be https://mail.yourparishcouncil.gov.uk where the "yourparishcouncil" bit is your gov.uk domain name. For example: https://mail.mappingtonparishcouncil.gov.uk. Your clerk will have been provided this link, so they may share it with you. This link may not work in the first 24 hours or a mail migration. If it doesn't go to this link instead: https://mail.cs.zohohost.eu/
  2. Enter your email address (all lowercase)
  3. Enter your temporary password
  4. Create a new password by entering it twice then click Set Password
  5. It may ask you to enter a phone number, you may choose to click "Skip this step"
You'll then be taken to the new webmail portal for your gov.uk email address.

We appreciate that logging into a webmail portal is not how most people send and receive email, so we recommend installing the following apps for your computer, laptop, tablet and/or mobile phone.

The benefits of using these apps instead of Outlook and built-in mail apps such as Apple Mail are;
  1. Natively compatible with all email, calendar and contact services
  2. Two factor authentication
  3. Fully segregated work and life on your devices

Desktop Apps

There are desktop apps available for Mac, Windows and Linux. Use the link below and select the type of computer you have to download it:
Once installed you'll need to enter your email address and password.
Do not use any of the Google, Facebook, Twitter etc options for logging in. They won't work for your gov.uk email address.

Mobile & Tablet Apps

There are mobile apps in the Apple App Store and Google Play Store. There are links for them here:
There is also a Mail Admin App for the Clerk which is useful for managing user accounts.

3. Connecting 3rd party apps

Please note: if you have Two Factor Authentication enabled then many of these apps will not work
To use 3rd party apps like Outlook, Apple Mail, Thunderbird etc, you'll need to:
  1. Make sure you're not using Two Factor Authentication (if this is mandated by your organisation then you'll have to use one of the Official Apps above)
  2. Enable IMAP in the webmail settings.
  1. Enable IMAP - tutorial here: Enabling IMAP
  2. Configure 3rd party apps - tutorial here: Connecting your mailbox to your email software

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