Online Suite

Dear colleagues,

Thank you for your patience. You were expecting an update in February, and I’m sorry this is reaching you slightly later than planned. I wanted to ensure we had a clear and deliverable plan before communicating next steps.

In the few weeks since I joined, my team and I have carefully reviewed the Online Suite and the feedback many of you have provided. It’s clear that delays and reliability issues have caused significant frustration and additional workload, and I want to acknowledge that upfront.

Starting now, we are changing both how we deliver improvements and how we communicate with you. We will commit to releasing groups of fixes and features on a quarterly basis, building on the parts of the system that already work well and steadily improving those that do not.

Over the next three months, leading up to the annual Conference, we will deliver the following changes:

Office holders: Fix and reinstate the ability to view and update office holder data in the Online Suite. These updates will synchronise properly with the main Connexional Database systems.
Duplicate or closed churches: Resolve the technical issue that can cause duplicate churches or closed churches to reappear.
Modernisation: Deliver initial improvements to the look and feel of the Online Suite to support future development and improve usability.
Forward plan: Add a link to a page that shows the planned roadmap for improvements, along with the expected timescales.

Ahead of each improvement, my team will send communications outlining what’s changing and anything you need to do in response.

Separately, Jane and I plan to establish a representative steering group to advise on and help prioritise future fixes and enhancements.

You will receive regular updates as work progresses, including summaries of what has been fixed and what improvements are planned. My aim is to give you clear visibility of our work and to ensure you see consistent, meaningful improvements. Please look out for further communications. If you need to get in touch beforehand then please contact us via the Online Suite support address - onlinesuitesupport@methodistchurch.org.uk

Thank you again for your patience and for the constructive feedback you continue to provide. It is directly informing our approach, and I am committed to ensuring that you start to see tangible progress soon.

Kind regards,

Andy Webb

Director of IT | The Connexional Team

Jane Bates

Senior Governance Executive Officer | The Connexional Team