Letters / Notices

Sending Letters and Notices

The ability to create and send notices and letters automatically makes Permit Manager an extremely useful and valuable time saving tool for all municipal employees.

Permit Manager's integrated Letter Writer saves you time and effort. Any number of form letters may be created, edited and stored in Permit Manager. You can choose to send a letter from any property or permit record. You then select from the list of form letters and Permit Manager does the rest. Permit Manager automatically includes the property and permit information in the letter and individually addresses a copy of the letter to all the individual contacts associated with the particular permit or property. A form letter may be edited for the particular instance when it is selected then printed or the individual letters can be sent to Microsoft Word® for further editing and printing.

The Parcel Map module further enhances the report and letter writing capabilities of the application. Mail Merge lists of parcel and owner information can be created by various selection methods and then automatically sent to Microsoft Word® for mailing labels or form letters. Parcel Map even enables the user to copy a screen map and paste it into the mail merge document.

Permit Manager allows the user to create any number of Letter / Notice templates.

Sending a letter or notice to a contact may be accomplished in the following manner.

From any Permit, Property or Violation record: Choose "Letters", "Send Letter to Associated Contacts" from the main menu. You may also right click on the record to open a shortcut menu. Select "Send Letter". The Send Letter dialog opens with only those contacts linked to the particular record listed as possible recipients of the letter. This function will also transfer the associated property, permit or violation data to the desired letter template.

To send a letter from the Multi-Select Property dialog: Highlight the desired records in the Multi-Select Property dialog the choose the "Send Letter" command on the dialog. This will open the Send Letter dialog with all the associated Owners listed as the recipients of a letter. Select the desired template letter from the drop down list and choose the "Edit" command. The selected template may then be altered for this particular instance. The application will automatically input the individual owner's name, mailing address, property description and physical location to the individual letters.

To send a letter to any individual or group of contacts in the database: Choose "Letters", "Send Letter" from the main menu:
This opens the Send Letter dialog with the recipient list will containing all the contacts in the database sorted by type.

From the Send Letter dialog select a Letter Template from the drop down list of available form letters. Let the "Use as Template" checkbox checked to edit the template for this letter only. These changes will not be saved. You can remove the checkmark to send the letter as it is saved.

Select a contact from the list by highlighting. If you wish to send the same letter to more than one contact check the "Multiple Selection" checkbox, highlight the desired Contact(s).

The "Print Preferences" may be checked as desired. The default state of these checkboxes is determined by the "Print Defaults" dialog setting.

Choose "Edit" or "Preview". If the "Use as Template" selection was checked the "Edit" dialog will open. If the Send Letter function was initiated by the "Send Letter to Associated Contact" command or a Property, Permit, contact or Violation record only the "Use as Template" option is available. From this dialog you may edit the template for this letter. These changes will be for this letter only, they will not be saved. If the "Use as Template" was not checked the letters will open in a preview mode.

From the Preview mode you can review the letter before deciding to print. If the "Print Envelope" checkbox was selected the application will prompt the user to print an envelope for the contact or labels if multiple contacts were selected when the preview is closed.

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Letter Templates

The Letter Templates opens the list of saved form letters / notices which can be used as templates. Existing letters may be edited by highlighting the desired letter and choosing "Open". This opens the Letter dialog for editing of the letter. The user will be prompted to save or discard changes.
New form letters or templates may be added to the list by choosing "New". Any number of form letters and notices may be added to the database.

Permit Manager supports the standard window key board shortcuts of "Ctrl + C" for coping highlighted text and "Ctrl + V" for pasting copied text. If you currently have Word documents as standard letters you can copy them into a new template within Permit Manager. Remember that Permit Manager automatically inputs the appropriate property and permit information into a letter so it is recommended to begin a letter with "In reference to the above mentioned property" or "In reference to the above mentioned permit".

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