Skip to main content

Alpha This is a new service. Help us improve it and give your feedback by email.

LocalGov IMS Walkthrough

Step-by-step guide to exploring the LocalGov IMS income management system with GOV.UK Pay integration

Try the LocalGov IMS Income Management System

20 minutes to experience LocalGov IMS

Process a payment, manage suspense items, run eReturns, and explore council income management.
No technical knowledge required

This walkthrough guides you through LocalGov IMS as a finance officer would use it. You'll process payments, review transactions, manage suspense items, and run end-of-day reports. Perfect for finance managers, revenues and benefits staff, and anyone evaluating income management systems.

LocalGov IMS is an open-source income management system designed for UK local authorities. It handles payment processing, account management, fund allocation, and financial reporting — the core back-office functions that every council needs to manage income from Council Tax, business rates, housing rents, and other revenue streams.

What you'll do

In this 20-minute walkthrough, you'll:

  1. Process a citizen payment — Use the payment portal to pay Council Tax through GOV.UK Pay sandbox (5 minutes)
  2. Review transactions as a finance officer — Search accounts, view receipts, and browse transaction history (4 minutes)
  3. Handle an unallocated payment — Find and resolve a suspense item that needs manual allocation (4 minutes)
  4. Run end-of-day cashing up — Generate an eReturn to reconcile the day's transactions (3 minutes)
  5. Process a bank file — Import and review a monthly bank reconciliation file (3 minutes)

Before you start

Important You must have already requested the LocalGov IMS scenario via NDX:Try.

Deploy the LocalGov IMS scenario if you haven't already. Deployment takes 35 to 55 minutes.

Sample data check

Ready Sample data is pre-loaded and ready to use.

What you'll learn

For finance managers

  • How LocalGov IMS structures income management workflows
  • Payment processing with GOV.UK Pay integration
  • Suspense item management for unallocated payments
  • eReturns and end-of-day reconciliation

For technical staff

  • Windows Server EC2 with IIS multi-site hosting
  • SQL Server Express on Amazon RDS
  • GOV.UK Pay API integration patterns
  • CloudFront HTTPS termination with ALB origins

What's included

Your deployment comes pre-loaded with:

  • 40 account holders across 10 council funds (Council Tax, business rates, housing rents, and more)
  • 500+ transactions showing realistic payment history
  • GOV.UK Pay sandbox for processing test card payments
  • Admin and payment portals — separate interfaces for staff and citizens
  • Sample suspense items requiring manual allocation
  • Bank import files ready for processing

Learn more about LocalGov IMS

Start walkthrough

Takes approximately 20 minutes

Need help?

If you're stuck, check the troubleshooting section or contact us.