Government Gateway Transition and Transformation Brief for Software Developers Oct 2016

Introduction - Changes to the Government Gateway  This communication provides information on changes to the current Government Gateway service over the next two years, impacts on software developers and actions required.  This presentation provides an update to the communication issued in July  Updates are highlighted in bold italics

Document submission protocol via transaction engine The change Impact on Software Developers {updated}  HMRC is building a replacement Transaction Engine that will support those Government Gateway message classes defined in HMRC tech packs.  The new transaction engine will replicate the Government Gateway Submission Protocol as defined at gateway-support-for-software-developers. gateway-support-for-software-developers  Change in the domain name of the URL for the Transaction Engine end point.  The replacement interaction will give revised end points for poll and submission. If this is hard coded in your products, the URL will need to be changed.  Software developers will need to change their product to use the new end point. A new VSIPS service will be provided to support integration testing.  Timing will NOT support the annual year on year changes for relevant regimes ( PAYE inc. RTI and SA).  Software developers will need to support an ‘in-year’ change. Timescales {updated}  We aim to complete the replication of the transaction engine by Sep – Dec 2017 to support decommissioning of the Government Gateway in early  A Private Beta phase will run during February and March  We are targeting Apr – Aug 2017 for a replacement VSIPS service (secure.dev.gateway.gov.uk), and May – Oct 2017 for a replacement live service (secure.gateway.gov.uk). Project RATE (Replication of APIs for Transaction Engine)

Document submission protocol via transaction engine Migration approach {updated}  We will make available the new domain names by Dec  Migration will be on a regime by regime basis. The replacement transaction engine service will be run in parallel with the existing transaction engine to allow for testing (so you can assure yourselves that you get the same behaviour with the replacement functionality) and a managed migration.  The expectation is that the migration will be conducted in 'staggers' by regime where each stagger will consist of: –HMRC making available a coherent set of message classes in the new transaction engine. –A set period of time in which test instances for both existing and new transaction engines service are available (VSIPS and new VSIPS). –Software Developers migrate their products to the replacement transaction engine service. –After a set period of time the message classes in the stagger are disabled in the existing Government Gateway after which any submissions for these message classes to the existing Government Gateway will result in rejection. The Gateway submission URL will NOT be disabled. Project RATE (Replication of APIs for Transaction Engine) Next steps {updated}  We are approaching a small number of software developers to participate in the Private Beta phase.  A more detailed update on timescales and actions will be provided in Jan 2017.

Enrolment Management and Client-Agent Relationship Migration The change {updated} Impact on Software Developers {updated}  HMRC is migrating Enrolment and Agent-Client functionality and data from Government Gateway into HMRC.  This will require the current Government Gateway public API to be replicated on the HMRC platform IF this service is still required: public-api-portal public-api-portal Next steps  Confirmation of decision regarding replication of public API will be provided in Nov Project EMAC  Online survey issued to software developers requesting information.  101 software developers responded to the survey in August/Sept  Of those who responded 7 software developers confirmed they utilised the current Government Gateway public API.  Given the low usage of the public API the recommendation is NOT to replicate the feature.

Government Gateway replacement The change Impact on Software Developers {updated}  A new authentication and credential management platform will replace Government Gateway and be in place in advance of the planned decommissioning by March  Discovery phase is currently underway and the approaches to migration are being explored.  The new service is expected to focus on credential management and authentication and will incorporate enhancements to security, extensibility and usability.  In Jan 2016 we asked for your feedback on a range of security improvements to Government Gateway. These are unlikely to be implemented into the current version, but taken up as a core set of requirements for the new platform. Next steps {updated}  We expect to be in a position to make the new Government Gateway Service available for integration summer  We expect software developers to follow a defined on-boarding process to support a seamless migration to a new authentication platform.  We will provide further information on the outcome of Discovery and future engagement and involvement by Jan 2017 with detailed information on the interface design. Project GG3

Background - Changes to the Government Gateway  The Government Gateway developed in 2002 is nearing end of life and the current arrangements and support contract for it’s delivery will end by March  HMRC currently uses Government Gateway to provide some functionality which needs to be migrated to the HMRC multi digital tax platform (MDTP) as part of the introduction of the new version of Government Gateway. This includes: –Document submission protocol via transaction engine –Enrolment management and Client-Agent relationship migration  Government Gateway will be redeveloped and redesigned with the current version / technology of the service decommissioned and replaced with a new version (currently referred to as Government Gateway 3) providing improvements to security, design and usability.