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Showing posts from August, 2023

About Start Software

Start Software is an award-winning developer and leading publisher of asbestos software, systems for the legal services industry and more.

Want to know more about asbestos software Alpha Tracker? Alpha Tracker is the most used asbestos software in the UK, Australia & New Zealand with more than 60m items of asbestos data stored.

Our legal services software Alpha Legal helps will writers, accountants, solicitors, IFAs and estate agents to communicate securely with clients. Read about developments here on the blog.

Or need help with Alpha Anywhere or Alpha Transform projects or software development? You'll find useful info here.

Our "troubleshooting" webinar is now ready to watch on YouTube

We've just uploaded the recording of our latest Alpha Tracker Tips & Tricks Webinar onto YouTube and our website.

Watch all the webinars again at https://alpha-tracker.co.uk/webinars

Robin & Dan showed how to troubleshoot problems and how you can help yourself and help us to help you!  We also showed how to access the job list and the calendar in the most efficient way.

The next live webinar will be on Tuesday 26 September at 12:30.  Register for free here

The inspirational Mavis & Ray Nye presented with a stunning oil portrait in recognition of their tireless work

The incredible and inspirational asbestos diseases campaigners Mavis & Ray Nye have been presented with an oil portrait painting as a thank you from the entire asbestos industry.

Ray & Mavis

Two industry leaders, Andrew Paten (UKNAR) and Colette Willoughby (NORAC), made the presentation on behalf of the industry to Mavis & Ray at their Kent home.

Andrew presenting the oil painting

The painting is a gift to the Mavis Nye Foundation which raises awareness, funds and provides support to victims of asbestos disease Mesothelioma.  Our Alpha Tracker director Robin is a Trustee of the Foundation and said "We are thrilled to receive the painting from the asbestos industry in recognition of the tireless and selfless work undertaken by Mavis & Ray since their diagnoses.  We will treasure the painting and ensure that as many people as possible see and appreciate it".

International asbestos community Asbestonomy features the Alpha Tracker "Damage" report

Asbestonomy, the International asbestos community, has featured our "Damage" report in their newsletter and on their website.

Read about the state of asbestos in UK schools, hospitals and houses

We still have a few printed copies available if you'd like one.  Get in touch if you do!

Join our Alpha Tracker Troubleshooting webinar on Tuesday and learn how to make your system run faster

Robin is running our free Alpha Tracker webinar on Tuesday showing how to troubleshoot problems in Alpha Tracker and how you can help yourself and help us to help you!  We'll also be talking about ways to make your system run faster, too.

Join Robin on Tuesday for the Tips & Tricks webinar

The webinar is on Tuesday 29 August at 12:30 and only lasts for 20-30 minutes.  Join and watch while you have your lunch!  

Find out more and register for free here: https://alpha-tracker.co.uk/webinars


Kim and Alan complete their Alpha Tracker training sessions - ATEC (Scotland) are now live!

Our Alpha Tracker trainer Kim has completed her training sessions with ATEC's director Alan MacDonald.  This means that Alan can now begin to use Alpha Tracker to help him increase efficiency and improve the service he gives to his clients.

Alan and Kim on a virtual training session

If we can help your asbestos consultancy to become more efficient, if even if you just want to take a look to see how Alpha Tracker compares to the software already in use at your business, get in touch.  We'd love to hear from you.

Email problem affecting some Alpha Tracker users. Sorry! We're working on it now

Some Alpha Tracker users are experiencing an email issue affecting the delivery of asbestos reports and quotations.  We are investigating now and expect to have a solution by noon on 10 August 2023.

Email issue 10 August 2023

The documents themselves are being created and can be downloaded from the report and and quotation folders until the problem is resolved.

For more information, contact the support teams at Alpha Tracker UK or Alpha Tracker Australia/New Zealand.

UPDATE @ 12:00 on 10/8/2023 - the solution is being applied to servers now.  Please bear with us and only contact the support teams if you have not already logged a ticket, thank you

UPDATE @ 15:30 on 10/8/2023 - we believe that all affected servers have been patched.  Please do contact us if you believe your system still has an issue, thanks.  Sorry for the inconvenience today


New feature! Export PDFs from project files by client, project type, date range or more!

Jack has added a great new PDF export feature to Alpha Tracker - take a look!

The new PDF export feature in asbestos software Alpha Tracker

Click and scroll below to see how to do it for yourself!

Top marks for our apprentice Jamie! Many congratulations from all of us

Our Support/Developer apprentice Jamie has completed his course and has been awarded a Distinction - top work! 

Team Leader Dan presenting Jamie's certificate at our Telford office

In addition to supporting our Alpha Tracker asbestos software system, Jamie also looks after our Alpha Legal service and yesterday he received a personal video message from TV presenter Michael Collie, the voice of the Alpha Legal videos.  Thanks, Michael, and congratulations Jamie from all of us here at Start Software on your perseverance, commitment and achievement.

Slightly fewer calls in July compared to June with 723 requests for help in total

Our performance was good again in July with 94% of high priority calls being resolved within 2 hours, and nearly 90% of all tickets being resolved within our KPIs.

That's especially good performance because we were slightly short-staffed due to some team members being on holiday.  Some new staff stepped in and helped out - here's one of them, Eleanor!

El helping out on the Support Desk

Don't forget, you can contact us 24x7, 365 days a year! We're always here to help.

Check out the new Integrations page on our Alpha Tracker website. See how many ways you can link to and from Alpha Tracker

We've updated our website to include the full list of software and systems that Alpha Tracker can interface with.  We've called the page Integrations and you'll find it on our website menu.

Visit https://alpha-tracker.co.uk/integrations

We've broken it down into 9 sections:

  1. Spreadsheet Import from Excel or CSV into clients, sites, jobs, appointments, asbestos data...

  2. Spreadsheet Export to Excel from any of the Alpha Tracker screens

  3. Accounts Systems including Xero, Sage and QuickBooks

  4. Zapier to link to Alpha Tracker to any Zapier-connected apps

  5. OpenAsbestos for asbestos data interchange with most of the key asbestos systems

  6. API enabling other software to connect to Alpha Tracker using Internet-standard methods

  7. Housing Software including most systems used by UK councils and housing associations

  8. Facility Management systems for property information exchange

  9. Property Inspection apps including Mobile Data Anywhere and Alpha Transform




Alpha Legal has been updated. Our Write a Will feature is now in partnership with CTT Group

Alpha Legal has received a major update!  There are new features and improvements throughout the system including an update to our new Will Writing feature.

Alpha Legal's Write a Will feature in association with CTT Group

To ensure that you have all of the legal know-how and support you need, we have now partnered with estate planning specialists CTT Group who have 1000s of will writing consultants working nationally.  They can help you with legal-technical queries when you are writing a Will for a client.

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