Creating Templates

The Comms Manager also supports sending emails via GOV.UK Notify, with templates written in a subset of Markdown.

This article describes a premium service. You'll need to have a GOV.UK Notify account and the GOSS GovNotify Connector (worker) to use this feature.

Markdown Template

Markdown templates are enabled when the Configuration is set to use GovNotify.

Making this change is universal - all of your templates will need to be rewritten using Markdown, and all emails will be sent via GOV.UK Notify.

The Notify service doesn't use the full Markdown syntax. See https://www.notifications.service.gov.uk/using-notify/formatting (opens new window) for the supported elements.

The expected use is for your full template to be written in the Comms Manager. This includes any product specific tokens, which will be expanded as the template is processed. See Bookings message templates and Case Management message templates for the current lists of available tokens.Your template is then passed to the Notify service as the ((body)) element in the GOV.UK Notify template.

Example

This body template includes Markdown syntax for a link and some tokens for Case Management.

Hello {{form_NAME}}, 

We have received your {{email_CASENAME}} and it has been assigned to our staff to review. 

You can follow progress of this by using the link below to access details of the case. 

[MyAccount]({{email_CITIZENLINK}})

Note the use of square brackets for the link text, and the email_ token placed inside parentheses.

This is passed to a basic template in Notify with the following placeholders:

The ID of this template is held in the Configuration and will be used for all emails sent via the Comms Manager.