ESB 22.07 Released

ESB 22.07 RELEASED Pentagull is pleased to announce the release of version 22.07 of the ESB platform. This release continues the recent trend of incremental improvements to reliability and usability as well as a fundamental design change.

Defra consultation

Recently Defra has put out a consultation regarding booking systems for HWRC’s and preventing LA’s from charging for DIY waste.  We welcome the findings laid out by the LGA and we are pleased to see that concerns regarding fly tipping have been investigated with the result being that no direct links were found.

Yet another local authority benefitting from our HWRC booking system

Bristol City Council are our latest customer to go live with our HWRC booking system. The integration of the system will provide effective traffic management and queue reductions at their existing Waste Reuse and Recycling Centres Avonmouth and Days Road. In addition to this, the system will also help manage congestion for the opening of the new site Hartcliffe Way, opening its doors on 21st June, by ensuring every visitor has their own allocated time slot.

ESB 22.04 Released

Pentagull is pleased to announce the release of version 22.04 of the ESB platform. This release continues the recent trend of incremental improvements to reliability and usability as well as providing some feature enhancements.

Pentagull welcomes another two customers!

Pentagull are thrilled to announce that South London Waste Partnership’s (SLWP) HWRC booking system and Hertfordshire County council’s commercial waste booking system have both gone live and are already receiving a high volume of bookings.

Providing our support for Ukraine

We are horrified by what’s going on in Ukraine, as I'm sure you are. Particularly cutting are the scenes showing young children and families fleeing a war zone or worse. At least 3 million people have fled their homes to escape conflict in Ukraine. Leaving behind jobs, belongings and loved ones, they now face an uncertain future. This morning we made a donation to the Disasters Emergency Committee.

Things are all go at Pentagull at the moment!

Here at Pentagull we are finishing the financial year off with a flurry of activity. South Lanarkshire Council are our latest customer to go live with our HWRC Booking System, meaning they are now seamlessly taking bookings for Carluke Recycling Centre.

Password Advice

We suggest to both our employees and customers that employing a strong password, with a mix of capitalised letters, numbers and special characters is the most effective way of reducing the chance of being compromised by unauthorised access. However, we don’t force regular password changes for several reasons.

ESB 22.01 Released

Pentagull is pleased to announce the release of version 22.01 of the ESB platform. This release continues the recent trend of incremental improvements to reliability and usability as well as providing some feature enhancements.

Can you help to bring some extra joy to children this Christmas?

Could you help spread a little extra festive cheer to care leavers in Blackpool?

Apache Log4j Vulnerability all clear for ESB

A quick update for our customers regarding the recently discovered Apache Log4j vulnerability.

Merry christmas from everyone at Pentagull!

Merry Christmas to all our customers from everyone here at Pentagull!

ESB 21.10 Released

Pentagull is pleased to announce the release of version 21.10 of the ESB platform. This release includes a mix of new features as well as refinements to usability and reliability.

ESB 21.07 Released

Pentagull is pleased to announce the release of version 21.07 of the ESB platform. This release includes some great new features in addition to the usual incremental improvements.

We're going to the next LARAC event, are you?

We are excited to announce that we will be sponsoring the Local Authority Recycling Advisory Committee (LARAC), event in Glasgow on 24th August 2021. The event we will be sponsoring will be held at the Grand Central Hotel and will look in depth at the key issues around running an efficient and effective local authority waste and recycling service.

Two booking systems live in one day!

We are extremely happy to announce that West London Waste Authority’s HWRC booking system and Findhorn Village Conservation Company’s motorhome booking system have both gone live and are now seamlessly taking bookings.

First Edinburgh libraries reopen with the help of Pentagull’s booking system

The City of Edinburgh Council opens the doors of its libraries today for the first time since the December 2020 lock down. The first 4 libraries will open today with the remainder opening at various times later this month. All visitors to the libraries are required to book a slot in advance via an online booking form provided by Pentagull. The booking form lets visitors choose a time that suits them with no risk of being turned away due to the libraries being too busy.

ESB 21.04 Released

Pentagull is delighted to announce the release of version 21.04 of the ESB platform. This release includes a range of incremental improvements in the areas of system configuration. There are also a number of technology improvements including use of updated Jquery and Bootstrap libraries and some security hardening.

Pentagull becomes an accredited Real Living Wage employer

We are pleased to announce that Pentagull has become a real living wage employer, accredited by the Living Wage Foundation. Our Living Wage commitment will see everyone working at Pentagull receive a minimum hourly wage of £9.50. This rate is significantly higher than the government minimum for over 25s, which currently stands at £8.72 per hour. This move will help solidify our long-term investment in our people.

Pentagull's migration to Redis for high availability session state

Session state is an integral part of the ESB platform - we use it to keep track of logged in users, transactions that are in progress and a whole host of other bits and pieces that don't make sense to send to the client or store in the database. Because of this, the infrastructure that provides our session state needs to be highly available and resilient to both planned and unplanned events.

A nice and exciting start to February!

Today has marked the day that our HWRC booking system took another step on the way to becoming sentient after our ANPR barrier integration went live at one of Moray Councils HWRC sites.

ESB 21.01 Released

Pentagull is pleased to start the year with the release of version 21.01 of the ESB platform. There are performance improvements, continued technology updates and new enhancements.

Pentagull’s Tip Booking System passes 1 million bookings

As the year draws to a close our Tip Booking System has now passed the 1 million booking milestone and continues to handle thousands of bookings every day.

ESB 20.10 Released

Pentagull is pleased to announce the immediate availability of version 20.10 of the ESB platform. The focus of the 20.10 release is on stability and fixes, however we’ve still found time to add some great new features.

G-Cloud 12 has officially launched!

It’s that time of year again (it’s a lot later this year due to covid) where the digital marketplace throws open its virtual doors, sets out its virtual market stalls and welcomes eager shoppers in to look at the software available (all social distanced of course).

Half a million!!

Half a million is the number of tip bookings we have processed since June this year!

Since January 1st we have processed 588 change requests… for free.

2 such change requests came from the registrars service at Blackpool Council. Covid 19 has brought with it an incredible need to be flexible in the face of something so inflexible.

How Far?

874 miles is the figure you will most likely get when you ask the question, how far is it from the top of the UK to the bottom of the UK?

Looking for a good cause?

When Covid-19 hit we were, as a world at best unprepared for what was to come. But people stood up all around us to make a difference.

G-Cloud 12 Is on its way at last!

So this Monday saw the submission of our latest G-Cloud offering, this year we have expanded the number of products available through the digital market place to 24!

ESB 20.07 Released

Pentagull is pleased to announce the immediate availability of version 20.07 of the ESB platform.

Last week was a pretty hectic week for Pentagull.

It was when four new systems went live for four new customers all on our cloud hosted ESB platform. To go from initial contact with a Council through to going live with a customised system in less than a month is a rarity in local government. But to do it for something that would be under serious scrutiny from the public and press all without any major issues was testament to the hard work put in by all the authorities and Pentagull!

ESB 20.04 Released

Pentagull is pleased to announce the immediate availability of version 20.04 of the ESB platform. The main focus of this release is stability and performance, though we’ve still managed to include a few new features.

How ESB is helping customers during COVID-19

All over the country people are having to adapt their ways of working in order to comply with the government’s social distancing guidelines and keep themselves safe.

Pentagull Achieves ISO9001 & ISO27001 Accreditations

After many months of hard work by the team here at Pentagull we are pleased to advise all our customers that we have received certification to ISO 9001 Quality Management and ISO 27001 Information Security Management.

COVID-19 readiness - March 17th

We’re all worried about the impact of COVID-19 on our lives and on society. At Pentagull we’re also concerned about the potential impact the spread of the virus could have on our team, their families and our client base. So we’ve been planning extensively for the likely scenarios and we wanted to share those plans with you so you can have confidence that we’ve really got your back in all eventualities.

Digitalisation of the Public Sector

Make sure to tune into Sky channel 191 - My TV, tomorrow at 10am

ESB 20.01 Released

Pentagull is pleased to announce the immediate availability of version 20.01 of the ESB platform.

Neat and Quote

Another one picked up because of rust

2019 ESB Product Round-up

As 2019 draws to a close we thought we’d have our annual look back at some of the highlights of this year’s ESB Agile product releases.

We like being a Little bit Different

Last week we attended a 2 day Local Government Partnership Network event. It was an extremely interesting and useful 2 days. The people we spoke to were passionate about their authorities and were all very focused on improving their services which is always good to hear.

Local Government Partnership Event

Pentagull are excited to be part of the local government partnership event taking place over the next 2 days in Milton Keynes.

Great news for Blackpool’s beaches

Some great news for Blackpool’s beaches today after being classified as good or excellent by DEFRA!

Bringing Joy to Children in Blackpool this Christmas

Blackpool Council has launched an appeal to help create hampers for children this Christmas

Important Changes to the Cyber Essentials Scheme

Changes are coming in 2020 to prepare it for the future.

What a day!

We had the pleasure today of doing something a little bit different in filming a piece with Collaborative Media for the Executive Tv channel on Sky.

October 2019 Product News

Here's a round-up of all our latest product news - including the release of ESB 19.10, updates to our Android app and enhancements to some of our third party integrations.

Great British Beach Clean!

It's like the bake off but with no cake and lots more sand…

Combating Rogue Landlords: Ensuring Safer and Securer Homes

We sponsored a very engaging event recently on combating rogue landlords. Whilst we were there, we got to meet some interesting people and listen to some very passionate speakers and delegates regarding what can be done to really improve people’s lives.

Pentagull are excited to be supporting Rogue Landlords Event

The last few weeks have been an exciting time at Pentagull as we have been getting ready to attend an event in London.

ESB 19.07 Released

Pentagull is pleased to announce the immediate availability of version 19.07 of the ESB platform. This release primarily focuses on fixes and stability improvements.

Manchester to Blackpool charity bike ride 2019

In aid of a very good cause and a good day out some of the team yet again pulled on the spandex to cycle from Manchester to Sunny Blackpool to raise money for Trinity Palliative Care Services and Brian House Children's Hospice.

G-Cloud 11 is Here

G-Cloud 11 is officially live, and we are very excited to say that we have expanded our offering on the digital market place to 16 products!

We Want the Best for the North West

Corporate responsibility can be fun and engaging, as Business Development Manager Stuart Gilbert tells us in this article about a recent piece of volunteering Pentagull did at Blackpool beach.

Anti-social behaviour 'nightmare' ignored, says report

A recent news article on the BBC about Anti-Social Behaviour caught our eye

ESB 19.04 Released

Pentagull is pleased to announce the immediate availability of version 19.04 of the ESB platform.

Birmingham Bin Strike: How ESB could help

As the dispute between refuse collectors and Birmingham City Council continues, we look at how ESB can help you communicate effectively with residents and businesses during times of crisis.

Do you need a Blue Badge Case Management System?

Today marks the official go live for our new Blue Badge Case Management System.

GDPR Flexes its Muscles

On the back of Google receiving a hefty £44m fine over breeching GDPR regulations there has never been a bigger example as to why you should be doing more about the data you collect and hold.

Blue Badge Fraud - are you doing all you can?

According to a recent article by BBC News, the majority of councils in England did not pursue anybody for abusing the Blue Badges scheme in 2017-2018.

ESB 19.01 Released

With the new year comes a new release of ESB, and Pentagull is pleased to announce that version 19.01 is now available to our customers.

Christmas Opening Times

Find out about our opening times over the upcoming Christmas and new year period.

2018 ESB Product Round-up

As 2018 draws to a close we thought we’d look back at some of the highlights of this year’s ESB Agile product releases.

Accessibility of Public Sector Websites: Are you ready?

The government is implementing new regulations to make public sector websites and apps accessible to everyone.

Building a Resilient ESB Cloud using Availability Zones

When Pentagull began evaluating cloud-computing providers towards the end of 2016 in readiness for launching our ESB cloud, one of our key design objectives was resilience.

Cost-effective GDPR Compliance

In this article we examine some of the features of the ESB platform designed specifically to address the requirements of data management and GDPR.

Increasing the Security of ESB User Accounts using the PIN

Both back-office and self-service user accounts in ESB have the facility to assign a 4-digit PIN in addition to the standard username/password.

ESB v18.10 Released

Pentagull is pleased to announce that the latest version of the ESB platform, v18.10 is now available to our customers.

Manchester to Blackpool charity bike ride completed!

The Pentagull team have completed the Manchester to Blackpool bike ride in aid of Trinity Palliative Care Services and Brian House Children's Hospice.

G-Cloud Listed!

Pentagull are pleased to announce that we are now listed on G-Cloud! Pentagull’s first offering to G-Cloud includes our Anti-Social Behaviour, Fleet Management and CRM modules to name a few.

Pentagull Achieves Cyber Essentials Certification

Pentagull is pleased to announce that we have been awarded Cyber Essentials certification for our internal and cloud-hosted infrastructure.

Are your cloud partners IPv6 ready?

As we finally run out of IPv4 addresses, is your infrastructure ready for IPv6?

Protect your data against DDoS Attacks

Following the recent high profile attack on GitHub, learn how Pentagull can protect your data against similar threats.

ESB 17.12 Released

Final release of 2017 brings collection of minor enhancements.

ESB v17.10 Released

Multi-factor authentication using one-time passcodes comes to the ESB platform.

ESB 17.09 Released

The latest release of ESB introduces the first steps towards conversion to MVC, as well as a host of other enhancements.