Release notes 2020

PlanSA components

PlanSA's ePlanning platform is made up of different online components:

PlanSA is committed to ensuring its ePlanning system is responsive to the needs of its customers.

To view or to check on the status of a current enhancement project, visit the PlanSA system enhancements.

System updates are made fortnightly. After each update, system enhancements are documented as Release Notes and published on PlanSA.

Requests for system enhancements can be submitted to the PlanSA service desk via PlanSA@sa.gov.au.

DAP system

Fixes
Documents storeWhen 'other' is selected as the 'document category' the text entered in the type description field now displays.
Application NumberingThe Development Application (DA) ID will represent the first 2 digits of the year in which the application is submitted, i.e. for the year 2020 the first development application submitted created the ID number 20000001. In 2021 the first DA submitted will be 21000001.

In case of Land Division (only) development applications the application number  will follow the existing EDALA numbering format OOO/ZXXX/YY (OOO = Council, Z = Land Division type X = unique ID and YY = Year). At the start of each new year the unique ID will re-start at 1.

PlanSA portal

Fixes
Where is my application wizardIn the Where is my application? Wizard, for a development application that is not a 'residential development' before 1 January 2010, the sequence of questions is replicated when the Back button is selected.

DAP system

Fixes
Submission - Building ConsentWithin the Consents page of a development application the question 'Has Construction Industry Training Fund Levy (CITB) been paid?' now displays information explaining the CITB levy.
Submission - Building ConsentWhen a development cost (excluding fit out of the building) equals $40,000 the Building Consent question 'Has Construction Industry Training Fund Levy (CITB) been paid? now displays.
Submission - DocumentsWithin the Documents page of a development application the question 'Do you have a pre-lodgement agreement?' now reads 'Do you have an agreement with a State Government agency related to your application? (pre-lodgement agreement)' and includes a resources link to additional information on pre-lodgement agreements available from the PlanSA portal.
Verification StatusThe verification status 'Start Verification' now includes the particular consent to be verified e.g. Start Verification - Planning or Start Verification - Building etc.
Building Consent - Assessment InfoWithin the Building / Building Work section in the Assessment Info page the question 'Has the applicant entered into a building works contract?' has been updated to include 'domestic' and now reads 'Has the applicant entered into a domestic building works contract'. The option to choose 'Not applicable' has also been added to the existing Yes and No responses.
Building Consent - Assessment InfoWithin the Additional Consent Info section of the Assessment Info page the NHHA Indicators now shows a fourth option of 'Not Applicable'.
Building Consent - Assessment InfoWithin the Building / Building Work section in the Assessment Info page when a 'Yes' response is selected for the question 'Has Home Owners Warranty been issued?' the 'Insurance Date of Expiry' now reads as 'Insurance Issue Date'.

PowerBI Report

Feature
Development Applications Awaiting Payment Click on the 'Reporting' button within the Assessments dashboard to view the 'Council Application Management Reporting (PowerBI)' link to then access the Development Applications Awaiting Payment Report which displays a list of application consents awaiting payment.

DAP system

Features
Assessment Dashboard - ReportingClick on the Reporting button within the Assessment dashboard to view the ‘Council Application Management Reporting (PowerBI)’ which is now available. This will direct you to a number of reports:
  1. Council Report (New)
  2. Work Load Analysis Reports
    • Relevant Authority Reason Report
    • End of Operative Date Report
    • Mandatory Building Notifications Report

PowerBI Report

Feature
Council ReportCouncil Report contains 13 dynamic metrics reports which provides at a glance and insight into the year to date development application statistics in your council area.
  • Numbers shows council’s year to date development application statistics.
  • DA shows on a map and table the Development Applications lodged.
  • Consents shows on a map and table the number of consents.
  • Accessibility shows applicant lodging applications behaviour; what days of the week and time of day.
  • Performance DAs shows number of days to make a decision.
  • Performance Consents shows average days taken by consent type.
  • Elements shows on a map and graph the elements assessed.
  • Zones shows a types of applications, i.e. Crown, Essential Infrastructure, Exempt, Impact Assessed, Code Assessed and Accepted broken down by zones.
  • Planning Consents shows total number of planning consents.
  • Building Consents shows total number of building consents.
  • Land Division Consents shows total number of land division consents.
  • Planning and Land Division Consents shows total number of planning and land division consents.
  • Statistics shows development application statistics and responses for further information.

DAP system

Features
Reporting Development Applications Awaiting Payment Report displays a list of consents awaiting payment.
Fixes
Land Division Certificate The Land Division Certificate status updates to 'Deposited' on receiving deposited plan information from Land Titles Office (LTO) completing the Land Division Certificate process.
Consent Decision email notification On granting a consent (Planning, Land Division, Building) the confirmation email 'banner' and 'body' now shows the type of consent granted, i.e. Decision Notification Form (DNF) Granted for Planning Consent - Application ID.
Online user account email notification On modifying the PlanSA user account the notification email now lists the accreditations that have been added, deleted or currently exist.
Development Application Summary The applicant has no ability to 'edit' the development application Submission Details and Location Details once submitted.
Development Approval For development applications lodged in the DAP system the Operative end date will show a date 24 months from the date of consent or development approval.
*Varied by the Planning, Development and Infrastructure  (General) (Lapse of Consent or Approval) Variation Regulations 2020
Development Approval In response to the Planning, Development and Infrastructure (General) (Lapse of Consent or Approval) Variation Regulations 2020 the following 'Advisory Notes' have been removed from the Decision Notification Form.

3. This consent or approval will lapse at the expiration of 12 months from its operative date, subject to the below.

4. An approved development must be substantially commenced within 12 months of the date of Development Approval, and completed within 3 years from the operative date of the approval, unless this period has been extended by the relevant authority.
Development Application Contact Details The contact details of a Development Application can be edited by the relevant authority and the applicant at any time during the assessment of the development application, and a record of the contact details changed is created.
Development Approval To complete the consistency check, the prompts to perform an action, i.e. Upload Stamped Plans-Dev Approval that previously displayed in the Decision screen now appear in the Consistency Check screen.
Email notifications The allocated assessor and relevant authority email notifications 'banner' now shows the name of the council and relevant authority.
Variations email notification When an applicant 'requests a variation' the assessor allocated to the current Consent and the relevant authority will be notified by auto-generated email.
Internal Referral When a consent decision has been made an 'active' internal referral will be closed and the assignee of the internal referral is notified by email.
Fee Advice - Referral Fees In the case of an application with multiple referrals you can now select the specific referral fees to be added to the Fee Advice.
Documents - Superseded Superseded documents by a relevant authority (other than the council assessment manager) now show the 'green tick' in the Superseded column.
Development Approval To complete the consistency check, the prompts to perform an action, i.e. Upload Stamped Plans-Dev Approval that previously displayed in the Decision screen now appear in the Consistency Check screen.

PlanSA portal

Feature
Make DAP Payment without logging into DAPTo make an online payment of a PlanSA Fee Advice go to the PlanSA portal and the Development Application > Track and application > Online Payments page without the need to use a login.

DAP

Fixes
Certificate of OccupancyThe questions relating to Maximum Occupants, Fire Report, and Essential Safety Provisions (ESPs) are not available when a Certificate of Occupancy (CoO) application has only a class 1A building / building work.
Take Control of an ApplicationIn the 'Access an application submitted by someone else' screen when the applicant takes control of the application by click the Home button it now returns to the Your Application dashboard.
Batch PaymentWhen Creating a Batch Payment if an invalid Fee is selected (e.g. Variation Fee advice) the system identifies this as an invalid selection, and the Create Batch Payment button is disabled.
Staged Building ConsentsAbility to edit the Stage 'description' within the Building Consent Summary tab during building rules assessment.
Staged Building ConsentsThe Nature of Development page in Building Consent Verification will now show the current stage 'number' and 'description' with the ability to edit the description.
Staged Building ConsentsWhen granting a building consent that has stages, the applicable stage descriptions will be displayed in the Decision Notification Form (DNF) under the IN REGARD TO: section.
Development ApprovalWhen granting Development Approval that has staged consents, all consent stages will be displayed in the IN REGARD TO: section of the Decision Notification Form (DNF).
RAP Correspondence Contact DetailsThe system generated emails and letters for a Consent where the Relevant Authority is a Regional Assessment Panel (RAP) and an Assessing Officer has been 'allocated', will include the Assessing Officer’s contact details in the Email/Letter Signature.

The system generated emails and letters for a Consent where the Relevant Authority is a Regional Assessment Panel (RAP) and an Assessing Officer has' not been allocated', will include the contact details of the Council of the Development Location in the Email/Letter Signature.
RAP Correspondence Contact DetailsThe system generated emails and letters for an application where the Relevant Authority is a Regional Assessment Panel (RAP), will include the contact details of the Council of the Development Location in the Email/Letter Signature.
RAP Correspondence Contact DetailsIn the table 'Contact Details of Consent Authorities' section of the Decision Notification Form (DNF) when the Relevant Authority is a Regional Assessment Panel, will include the contact details of the Council of the Development Location.
Submission - ElementsDuring the application submission when element 'Change of Building Classification' is selected, Class 7 expanded plus 10C included as an option in the drop-down menu for "What is the existing building classification question?” and “what is the proposed building classification question”.

PowerBI Report

Fixes
Receipts Report In the Receipts Report a Payment Reference column has been added and the Invoice Reference column name has been updated to read 'Payment Reference'.

DAP system

Features
Batch payment Ability to view all development application fees that are currently outstanding with the option to make payment in one batch by credit card.
Fees When a relevant authority is determining the consent or development approval fees they now have the capability to view previously paid fees to ensure all relevant fees have been invoiced.
Fixes
Submission The 'Take Control' email will only be sent when the "I am submitting this application on behalf of the applicant(s)" is  checked by the relevant authority.
Submission When the relevant authority is completing the Applicants page during submission, the 'I am submitting this application on behalf of the applicant(s)' is set as default.
Fee payment email notification Improved the wording in the 'Payment Successful' email notification to the relevant authority to include; development application ID number, and the name of the consent under assessment.

PlanSA portal

Fixes

DAP Log-in

When you login to the PlanSA portal you will now see four login options that are applicable to what you want to do in the portal. They are:

  • I want to lodge, manage or track my application
  • I work as a Relevant Authority
  • I work for a Referral Agency
  • I want to review my Accredited Professional status

DAP system

Features
Code to DAPWhen verifying Planning and/or Land Division Consent the applicable Policy Part/s of the Planning and Design Code (for all assessment pathways) for each element is available as a PDF document link within the Category of Development page and accessible within the Document store.

When a development application is lodged a second snapshot of the applicable P&D Code Rules is taken for the assessment pathway determined for each element (e.g. deemed-to-satisfy, performance assessed) and is available as a PDF document link within the Documents store.
Advance SearchDate of referral distribution' field provides the ability to search by Referral Body and determine the number of referrals in the DAP system for a selected date range.
Fixes
Building ConsentFor development cost less than $12,000 the question 'Has the applicant entered into a building works contract?' will not display within the Building or Building Work screen.
ReferralWhen Council is the referral body the Response Type has been corrected to show Regulation 23(2)(b).

DAP system

Features
Document StoreAn indicator to identify a document has been superseded is now available within the Documents store for the applicant.
Development ApprovalAbility to capture building supplementary information in relation to whether the building is detached (free standing) or attached to another building or structure.
Fixes
Development ApprovalAbility to process an invoice refund for fees incorrectly invoiced and paid during Development Approval.

PlanSA portal

Features
Development Approval WizardAbility to search an address with the SAPPA tool from the What is the property? question.
Fixes
Development Approval Wizard Updated the rules for 'Deck' - Bushfire Outback (Regional) to advise the applicant 'You may not need approval' instead of ‘You will need to apply for approval'.

DAP system

Fixes
Request for Information (RFIs) In the RFIs page and the Further Information Requests table the wording for the action "Make decision" has been updated to read "Evaluate RFI response".
 
Updated the naming of the "Generate request for additional documentation document" link to read "Generate request for additional information document" and the associated word template 'request for information' is now linked.
Document store A filter will not appear if there are no related documents.
For example, if there is no email document, then the System-Generated Emails filter button is hidden.
Building Notification Council who issued the development approval will now receive the mandatory building notification email.
Fee Refund When determining a fee refund the amount to refund (GST inclusive) will now automatically default to the Total Paid amount.
Development Approval When placing a development approval on hold, the Reason for placing on hold field character limit has been increased from 250 characters to 4000 characters.

PlanSA portal

Fixes
Resources When you select 'Design' as the filter by topic within the Resources page, the search will return documents specific to 'Design'.
Feature
Release Notes A link to the Release Notes is available from the PlanSA footer by clicking on the word 'Release' located to the right of the 'News' link.

DAP system

New features
Building Notifications The full description of the building work activity is now displayed in the Notification column within Building Notifications tab.
Certificate of Occupancy New feature to request and issue a Certificate of Occupancy (CoO) for all new buildings Class 1 to 9 (and building work where applicable) to provide the owner assurance the building is suitable for occupancy.
Development Approval Ability to capture supplementary information in relation to Frame Material, Wall Material and Roof Material within the Statistics tab during development approval.

PowerBI Report

Fixes
Daily Till ReportPayments received for development approval over the counter and receipted in the DAP system are now accounted for in the Daily Till Report.

DAP system

New features
Fees To assist with identifying overridden fees for auditing purposes, now have the ability to override a fee amount to $0 and provide a reason.
Reporting Public Notification Days Left Report displays a list of applications with 5 business days or less left on public notification.
Reporting Relevant Authority Referral Response Days Left Report displays a list of applications with 2 business days or less left for a Relevant Authority to respond to referral(s).
Reporting Allocated Applications Report displays applications with allocated assessor(s) against consents and development approvals.
Reporting Referral Agency Response Days Left Report displays a list of referrals with 5 business days or less left for response.
Fixes
Contact details Removed 'other' from appearing as a contact salutation within correspondence.

PowerBI Report

New features

Workload Analysis Report

Workload Analysis Report for Relevant Authorities containing three reporting tabs:

Relevant Authority Reason Report displays a list of consents currently under assessment by Relevant Authority.

End of Operative Period Report displays a list of applications with consents that have reached the end of their operative period.

Mandatory Building Notifications Report displays a list of building notifications grouped by stage and then building / building work requiring an inspection.

DAP system

New features
ReportingA Reporting button located within the dashboard image on the right hand side is now available to access and generate the Unallocated Applications, Days Left to Decision, and Days left in Verification reports.
ReportingThe Unallocated Applications Report displays a list of applications without an allocated assessor.
ReportingThe Days Left to Decision Report displays a list of applications with 5 business days or less remaining for a decision to be made.
ReportingThe Days Left in Verification Report displays a list of applications with 5 business days or less left in the verification stage.
Fee advice, refund advice and tax invoiceThe fees are now grouped under the applicable fee category, i.e. Planning, Land Division, Building, Compliance and Referral in the Fee Advice, Refund Advice and Tax Invoice, to assist the recipient in identifying the breakdown of the fees in assessing their development application.
Fixes
Allocated user displayWhen you hold the mouse over the ‘Who’ icon in the For Your Action, Assessment in Progress and Waiting tabs, it will display the name of the person currently undertaking the next task in the active consent.

DAP system

New features
Development approvalAn on screen message will instruct that Stamped Plans must be uploaded in the ‘Documents’ store before development approval can be granted.
Decision and development approvalThe authority can preview a  'draft' version of the Decision Notification Form (DNF) in a PDF format before a decision is made for the Consent or Development Approval.
Development approvalThe contact details for the Relevant Authority and primary contact can be viewed from the Development Approval 'Summary' screen.
Fixes
SubmissionAn on screen warning message displays when the Element Other - Residential, Commercial, Community, Infrastructure and Rural description exceeds the maximum number of characters (500).
ConsentsWhen granted consents are inconsistent the Relevant Authority who granted the last consent now has the ability to edit reserved matters, conditions, or advisory notes.
Document uploadAn on screen warning message displays when uploading a document that exceeds the maximum file size limit of 70MB.

DAP system

New features
For your actionNew action ‘Awaiting Refund Endorsement’ is visible in the financial approvers For Your Action tab, when an assessing officer has requested the endorsement of fee refund.
For your actionNew action ‘Refund Endorsement Refused’ is visible in the assessing officer’s For Your Action tab, when the financial approver does not endorse the fee refund.
For your actionNew action ‘Respond to Internal Referral Request’ is visible in the nominated recipients For Your Action tab, when an assessing officer has requested internal advice.
For your actionNew action ‘Internal Referral Response Received’ is visible in the initiator’s For Your Action tab, when the recipient responds to the request.
For your actionNew action ‘Respond to Decision Endorsement Request’ is visible in the nominated recipients For Your Action tab, when an assessing officer is requesting endorsement of an assessed consent decision.
For your actionNew action ‘Decision Endorsement  Refused’ is visible in the assessing officer’s For Your Action tab, when the nominated financial approver does not endorse the decision.
For your actionWhen a development application has multiple actions to be completed, then the most urgent action will be displayed in the For Your Action tab.
For your actionAbility to view multiple actions for completion from the development application Status Detail from the For Your Action tab and the Summary page, including the timeframe for completion clock with the number of business days (as applicable).
ReferralsNew capability to reassign an internal referral request from one team member to another.
RefundsNew capability to reassign the endorsement of a refund request from one team member to another.
DecisionNew capability to reassign the endorsement of decision from one team member to another.
Fixes
Dashboard displayIncreased the number of development applications displayed from 5 to 10 for each dashboard tab; For Your Action, Assessments in Progress, Waiting, Upcoming and Building Notifications.

DAP system

A new process is available to manage transitional applications seeking Building Consent where Planning Consent and/or Land Division Consent has previously been granted under the Development Act 1993.

New features
SubmissionNew question added to capture whether a Planning Consent and/or Land Division Consent has already been granted prior to 31 July 2020 under the Development Act 1993 for transitional applications.
If a transitional application has had a consent granted under the Development Act 1993, there is the ability to input the Application Number and Date Granted for that consent.
New document categories added to cater for transitional applications, including Decision Notification Forms and Stamped Plans which are flagged as mandatory. The applicant cannot submit their application until they have uploaded both of these documents for the previous consent(s) granted under the Development Act 1993.
Organisation conditions and notesAdded standard condition and note "Please see DNF for existing Application Number" for both Planning Consent and Land Division Consent.
Section 7 reportFormat changed from PDF to Word enabling the ability to add comments as required.
Fixes
Email notificationsEmail notifications sent to the relevant authority are now sent to the assigned assessor's individual email, rather than their organisation's group mailbox. If no individual assessor has been assigned, the email notification is sent to the organisation's group mailbox as per previously.

DAP system

New features
Mandatory building notificationsThe Statement of Compliance is available as a Word document template when submitting the final mandatory building notification.
Essential safety provisions (ESPs)New question "Is a Form 1 - Schedule of ESPs installed or to be installed required?" has been added.
Assessment informationThe Number of Occupants field is now visible for building classes 1b and 2-9 and hidden for building classes 1a, 10a, 10b and 10c.
New response option Not applicable for this stage added to the question "Is Certificate of Occupany Required?".

Building Class 7 now split into two class categories:

  • Class 7a: Carpark
  • Class 7b: Building that is used for storage or display of goods or for wholesale produce.
DecisionOption added to indicate if a performance solution forms part of the building assessment and if so provides advice that upload of performance solution documentation is required.
SubmissionAbility to add multiple builders or contractors contact details.
Fixes
Assessment informationCorrection of the Building Class 2 description to "Building containing two or more sole occupancy units".
Correction of the Building Class 6 description to "Shop or other building used for the sale of goods by retail or the supply of services direct to the public".
Correction of the Building Class 9c description to "Residential care building".
SubmissionChange of wording to read "Is the development being constructed by an Owner Builder?"