Atturra completes first phase of Unitywater development portal

Atturra has announced the completion of the first phase of a customer portal and CRM solution for Unitywater, aimed at enhancing the experience of land-developer customers in South-East Queensland.

The Development Portal is part of a broader initiative to streamline applications for connections, disconnections, and alterations to water and wastewater networks.

Unitywater serves over 800,000 residents in the Moreton Bay, Sunshine Coast, and Noosa regions, areas characterised by rapid growth. The Development Portal, designed by Atturra's Cloud Business Solutions team and powered by the Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Experience Platform and Microsoft Power Platform, has processed nearly a thousand applications since its launch in July.

Historically, Unitywater relied on an assortment of tools to manage applications, resulting in inefficiencies and oversight challenges. The new portal consolidates these tools into a single platform, automating key processes and integrating with at least six legacy systems. This automation replaces former manual workflows, emails, spreadsheets, and attachments, easing the overall management of applications, payments, and data trends.

Users now benefit from a comprehensive online application process, which includes secure payments and real-time updates on application statuses. Additionally, the portal allows developers to view inputs from third-party consultants, ensuring transparency throughout the application journey.

Among the portal's key features are automated quote management, water infrastructure agreements, and streamlined releases of bonds and funds. The design employs clear workflows to minimise human error and improve decision-making through advanced reporting and analytics capabilities.

As it develops further, the platform aims to accommodate at least 1,000 users, including developers, consultant engineers, and other industry stakeholders. Unitywater's Executive Manager, Katherine Gee, remarked, "Atturra worked closely with Unitywater to bring our vision to life. The improvements we've implemented together have laid the foundation for more significant system improvements that will have a material positive impact on the Unitywater business and its development customers. We're facing high levels of growth in our region and the new system provides a foundation to deliver more approvals to enable this growth."

The Development Portal is hosted on Microsoft Azure and integrates seamlessly with existing Unitywater applications such as Novoplan, Gentrack, and Maximo. These integrations support the automation of repetitive tasks like notifications and data updates, creating a more streamlined operation.

The project is set to continue into a second phase, which will introduce additional enhancements and functionalities aimed at further enriching the user experience for developers and certifiers. Greg Mace, Executive General Manager of Atturra's Cloud Business Solutions, stated, "Our extensive experience in the utilities sector, combined with our collaborative approach, has enabled us to make a significant contribution to Unitywater's operations. We look forward to continuing our partnership with Unitywater, bringing new functionality to their customers and further establishing ourselves as a trusted Microsoft partner in the utilities and energy industry."