Introduction of Discount Families for 16-18 Qualifications

The Summer Release (2018) introduced a new Discounting Family field for 16-18 Qualifications in compliance with DfE specifications announced in January this year.  The field must be populated for all 16-18 qualifications in order to be included in KS5 PI reporting. Tools / Exams / Manage Qualifications the field will show in red for all…

Colour in Sims Assessment – Individual Reports

When adding colours within a cell in a marksheet, (right clicking on the cell “Select colour to a cell”)  the colour will NOT pull into individual reports.  If you want the colour to pull into an individual report along with the result, it will need to be coloured using a Nested If Then Else formula…

Current Supplier List in FMS

When exporting a Supplier List from FMS Reports, it shows all suppliers including the ones that are no longer ‘In Use’. A workaround for this, is to go into the supplier list and use the export button in the top right corner of the screen. Once you have saved the file, navigate to it and…

Identifying addresses modified by CTF import bug

The report can be downloaded by clicking below, please save as to a suitable location, and extract the file so that it shows in your File Explorer as Address change history.rptdef, ready for import into SIMS. Address change history report.zip download For instructions on how to import a report into SIMS, please see the in-depth…

Patch to fix bug in CTF import for applicants

Non-hosted schools only: Please download patch 23971 if you are planning to import CTF files using the “add new pupils” option and place them in a pre-admission group. Capita have identified a bug in the software which can incorrectly link a pre-admission pupil to an existing contact. In addition it can incorrectly update that existing contact’s address if there…

Who has access or the ability to view SIMS Parent App?

*Updated 05/07/2019*   Which contacts associated on a student record has the ability to access SIMS Parent App? SIMS Parent App/Parent App Lite The current functionality is that any contact or guardian that has Parental Responsibility and no Court Order will be able to access SIMS Parent App, and have the ability to see the…

Trial Balance Comparison – compare greyed out

Usually – check that all the settings in both windows match, if not the files will not compare. Often it is the month or fund which is different so a new file needs to be selected. Rarely – check “Scomis_Apps” database version of the dbo.adopCreateTruncate stored procedure is not out of date (Infrastructure Team will…

Cannot load or display internet web page

Try a different web browser i.e. Chrome, Internet Explorer, Edge, Firefox Try pinging the web page i.e. ping scomis.org and see if it gets a response and resolved to an IP address (Reply from 37.128.134.205: bytes=32 time=12ms TTL=54). If there is no IP address, there may be a problem with the DNS/Hosts file which is usually…

How to edit seating plan in Exams

This can be found within the Examinations module under Tools>Component Sitting Integrity Check kb21643   Reviewed 24/5/19           Reviewed 24/5/19

Migration Report for Arrivals duplicating entries

This is due to incomplete, duplicated or multiple entry information in the ‘School History’ section of the student record. If incomplete or duplicated then correct the data and run the report again. If genuinely multiple schools then the report will show a line for each, if this is not what is required then edit the report…

Assigning users additional shortcuts within Hosted SIMS

If you have user management access within SIMS.net, you are able to assign users at the school with additional shortcuts. The shortcuts for the users appear along the left side panel and can be viewed/hidden using the 2 green arrows in the top left of the screen. In order to assign the shortcuts, under the…

Deleting Discover Groups from SIMS

Focus | Groups | Discover Groups Discover Groups in SIMS no longer exist in Discover. How can these be deleted from SIMS? Please call the Scomis Service Desk on 01392 385300 as a patch will need to be applied to delete the groups.

How do I create an Achievement Points by Registration Group graph in Discover?

In Discover there is a ‘Behaviour Points by Registration Groups’ graph but not one for Achievements. How do I create one? To see this information in Discover: 1. Please open Discover and click the Pupil button. Drag the graph ‘Student Totals by Year Group’ onto the canvas. Click the Achievement button and drag the appropriate…

What is the difference between a Discover and Dynamic group?

When saving a new Group in Discover, there is an option to save as ‘Discover’ or ‘Dynamic’. A Discover Group is only available in Discover, whereas a Dynamic Group is also available in SIMS. A Dynamic Group will allow any Supervisors of the Group to see any changes, such as when a Student has left the…

Installing the V6 Scomis Hosted Apps Connector

For a school to be able to access the updated Server 2016 based Scomis Hosted Apps platform, they will need to install the latest version of the connector. To do this, first download the latest V6 connector from: http://simsts.scomis.org/ScomisHostedAppsV607.msi (this will be updated as necessary) Once downloaded, ensure the user is logged out of the Hosted…

Report for Behaviour/Achievement points over a date range

Current functionality in SIMS makes this almost near impossible or extremely complex to make, so that you can run a report for behaviour/achievement conduct points over a date range. You can download the report definition file below and import into SIMS (Reports > Import), which has made this possible:   Conduct Net points over date…

Direct SQL Access accounts – Hosted Platform – 3rd Party Software Integration

Scomis have reviewed the process of data extractions from SIMS databases by third party applications and in particular by accounts that bypass the sims application (interface) and talk to the sims SQL database directly (known as Direct SQL access). The audit has been completed as a result of the new GDPR regulations coming into force…

Homepage Quick Search shortcut reporting criteria/tokens

The quick search on the SIMS homepage can be used as a quick reporting tool to help you find information. You can view details of search tokens available in Quick Search by entering the search string ‘help’ – use the scroll bar to view the entire list. Search tokens, starting with #, are used to…

Attaching QCA Codes

Please click here: Attaching-QCA-Codes Reviewed on 24/5/19  

GDPR Information for Schools including Data Retention

For further information on GDPR Regulation for schools, see the Scomis website Scomis Guidance on GDPR Or alternatively see the following sources for guidance : DfE Data Protection Toolkit Within this link : Information Record Management Society – School’s Toolkit the Document ‘Information Management Toolkit for Schools’ contains a Data Retention Schedule at the end of the…

Manual SIMS/FMS/Discover Upgrades

For schools NOT using SOLUS3 to deploy their SIMS/FMS/Discover upgrades please advise them to check the following location for the latest upgrade files: http://solus2.scomis.org/latest-release-files/ In this folder you will find the latest Capita upgrade files for SIMS, FMS and Discover. These files are direct from Capita and as such are password protected. The passwords for…

NOVA-T6 – How to split a double session period into two single periods

Within Nova T-6 click on Sessions This will show the groups and clusters on the left-hand side of the screen and the sessions on the right- hand side of the screen. Under the Sessions column (on the right hand side) right click on D (for double). This will then automatically change the D to two…

Sending In-Touch messages to applicants – ‘The following recipients do not have any selected communication method’

When sending messages to applicants through In-Touch, you may receive the error ‘The following recipients do not have any selected communication method’. The reason this is not picking up any of the applicants contact details is because its trying to pick up the applicants contact details themselves. Please change the category to ‘InTouch Contacts of…

RTF report not saving changes

When amending an RTF formatted report within SIMS, you may find that the changes you have made haven’t saved. This is due to an RTF report needing to be saved in a different way. Under the ‘Add-ins‘ tab within the toolbar at the top of the page within Microsoft Word, there is an option for…

Submitting KS2 Results to NCA Tools Website (Hosted Schools)

Submitting KS2 Results to NCA Tools Website (Hosted Schools) Currently Schools are unable to access the NCA Tools website via Internet Explorer in Scomis Hosted Applications. https://ncatools.education.gov.uk/Teacher-Assessment/Home.aspx They receive either of the following two errors that are shown below   Testing performed by Scomis has revealed that the website actively blocks connection requests from the…

Using the Egress Application

If you need assistance on how to use the Egress Application for sending secure emails via Outlook please click the link below to read our guide: Using the Egress Application If you have any questions please call the Scomis Service Desk on 01392 385300 or email us at scomis@devon.gov.uk.