CCS to fund the rollout of the Atamis e-commerce system for health sector

The Atamis e-commerce system will be rolled out across all health sector organisations that wish to adopt it, following funding from Crown Commercial Service (CCS). 

CCS, the UK’s largest public procurement organisation, is working in partnership with NHS England and the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) to provide Atamis software licences to support health sector buyers, procurement teams, data analysts, and commercial teams to adopt the e-commerce system.

The investment will encourage all health sector bodies to use the same system for pipeline management, tendering, supplier management and contract management, delivering significant commercial benefits such as greater commercial effectiveness, efficiency, sustainability, and resilience.

Commercial benefits

More than 90 health and NHS organisations have already successfully onboarded to Atamis, and will also be able to benefit from the new funding to increase usage of the system. 

Commercial teams will have access to data-driven insights, administration costs will be slashed through automated data collection and reporting, and it will be easier to adopt new rules such as those proposed in the Procurement Bill.

CCS will provide DHSC with around £12.8m funding – £4.2m over each of the next three years. DHSC will invest this in the Atamis software and system, and data practitioners who will manage the service and identify commercial opportunities that can drive efficiency and supply chain resilience. 

The investment comes from the surplus CCS generates as a levy on the value of the business suppliers receive through its agreements.

Jacqui Rock, Chief Commercial Officer for NHS England says:

Moving to one e-commerce system will make a significant contribution to our wider efforts to support the NHS to deliver the maximum possible benefit for patients from every pound of taxpayer investment.  

Atamis will also make it easier for suppliers, especially SMEs, to do business with us, and will help us meet our sustainability requirements as part of our commitment to be Net Zero by 2045.

Helen MacCarthy, Deputy Director for Health at Crown Commercial Service says:

We’re making this investment to give something back to the health sector, enabling better outcomes for our customers. Leveraging the scale and expertise of CCS and the health sector, and the business intelligence from Atamis, will help us get the best value from procurement.

Melinda Johnson, Commercial Director for the Department of Health and Social Care says:

The successful implementation of Atamis across DHSC and our arm’s-length bodies has enabled us to standardise procurement processes, made it easier for our buyers to collaborate, and has reduced cost of ownership for all. The accumulation of improved data is enabling our commercial teams to deliver more commercial benefits and improve supply chain resilience.

Licences are offered on a non-mandatory basis.

Find out more

Download our latest digital brochure for the latest information on our agreements and how we can help you add power to your procurement.

Need help with the core concepts and processes of procurement? Read our Procurement Essentials guides.

 

 

CCS proactively helping suppliers with PPN 06/21 implementation

Crown Commercial Service (CCS) is undertaking a proactive campaign of activity to help our suppliers understand and act on the requirements outlined in Procurement Policy Note 06/21. PPN 06/21 asks that suppliers confirm their commitment to achieving net zero by 2050 by calling on them to produce a Carbon Reduction Plan (CRP).

“We are educating and encouraging the entire public sector supply chain to step up and meet the Governments’ Net Zero policy ambitions. Working alongside our customers, our suppliers are critical to our ability to deliver. We need their expertise, products, services, compliance and effective reporting to enable our customers to deliver their commitments,” explains Joe Tilley, Sustainability Director and Strategic Portfolio.

Setting up a Carbon Reduction Plan is fundamental to achieving net zero emissions. For this reason, CCS is taking steps to ensure our supply base complies with the latest PPN. Ultimately, our goal is to show our customers what our suppliers and we are doing to meet the Government’s Net Zero target.

Here is a summary of what’s being done to help achieve this goal:

Providing ongoing CRP training

Since December 2021, the CCS sustainability team has run weekly training events to enable suppliers to produce, release, and maintain a CRP that conforms to the requirements detailed in PPN 06/21. So far, thousands of suppliers have completed the training and are on their way to producing and releasing compliant CRPs. Suppliers can enrol in the interactive CRP and training session at any time.

Conducting complimentary CRP document reviews 

In the next support phase, we will offer our suppliers a complimentary CRP document review to help them meet the required standard set out by the supporting guidance to this PPN. A dedicated team of Document Compliance Officers will review supplier CRPs, assessing the documents against the critical points outlined in the PPN 06/21 guidelines.

“This work will ensure our supply base is ready for future agreements. In addition, the service will help free up their time and efforts to focus on the technical requirements of the tenders rather than setting up a CRP in the short bidding window that they may have as part of the procurement,” says Marie-Helene Durif, Deputy Director, Technology Products & Services.

Making supplier CRPs visible on the CCS website

Once a CRP has been reviewed and can pass the selection criteria stipulated in the PPN guidance, we will add its URL link to the CCS website. As a result, customers can easily see our supply base’s CRPs and understand how their supply chain is embracing the 2050 target. 

When will the CRP review service be operational?

Our dedicated team of Document Compliance Officers will be in place from July 2022 for a fixed period. The team will be available for several months.

When will suppliers be made aware of the CRP review offer?

In the next few weeks, we will contact any supplier that has not yet provided CCS with a CRP. The supplier will receive a request to submit their published CRP for review. The submission link will be unique to the supplier’s organisation, not generic. 

Once a supplier submits their published CRP using the form provided, a Document Compliance Officer will review the CRP document against the key points outlined in PPN 06/21. The guidance on adopting and applying PPN 06/21 is available on GOV.UK. 

How can a supplier contact the CRP review team? 

Any supplier with CRP-related queries can contact the Document Compliance team by emailing CRP@crowncommerical.gov.uk. Suppliers can also find answers to the top frequently asked questions about PPN 06/21 on the CCS website.

Discover how CCS can help local authorities with their crisis management response

The agreement has taken on board the lessons learned from Covid-19 Managed Quarantine Service (MQS), Afghan repatriation and asylum work programmes. It provides a range of crisis management services such as repatriation, emergency accommodation and MEDEVAC, which is the emergency evacuation of the sick or wounded (from a combat area). 

For the first time, access to these services as a contingency arrangement to support British and foreign nationals is available to you in response to a crisis situation. A crisis situation could cover any number of activities, for example, the repatriation of British nationals, emergency accommodation for key workers, rough sleepers, asylum seekers, unaccompanied minors and displaced residents from within the UK and countries around the world.

Lot 2 (Booking Solutions UK and Overseas) and Lot 3 (Booking Solutions Specialist Needs) provide crisis management as an optional service. This is in addition to traditional travel booking solutions including air, rail and accommodation, ground transportation and supporting ancillary services, such as passenger tracking or passport and visa services. You can choose from 2 experienced travel suppliers. Lot 4 suppliers (Booking Solutions Venues and Events) can provide urgent accommodation when needed. 

To find out more about Travel and Venue Solutions visit the agreement webpage or contact our customer service team at info@crowncommercial.gov.uk or 0345 410 2222.

4 tips on how to achieve value for money on your next medical waste disposal procurement

The proper disposal of medical waste is vitally important to our communities and our environment. When waste is improperly disposed of, drinking water can become contaminated, toxic metals can spread in the environment and disease and infection can spread.

At CCS, we’re here to empower you to keep our citizens and our environment safe, comply with waste legislation and achieve your social value aims, while making sure you make the most of your budget. 

Here, we list 4 tips to ensure you get the medical waste disposal services you need at the best possible price.

Tip 1: Find the best procurement route

Use a procurement route that:

  • fully complies with procurement regulations
  • provides access to a broad range of suppliers from the industry
  • has experts who have helped similar buyers with their waste procurements

Wherever your organisation is in the UK, you can run medical and hazardous waste procurements using our Building Cleaning Services DPS. It has a set of contact terms that are pre-agreed by suppliers, and has experts at hand to help you every step of the way.

Tip 2: Outline exactly what you want

An informative, accurate and detailed requirements specification is essential for any successful procurement.

It’s important to include all of the key details that suppliers need to assess their potential offerings and produce a bid that meets your requirements. For example, it’s good to include:

  • accurate estimates of volumes per site, split by waste type
  • any access restrictions for each site
  • current collection frequencies
  • key performance indicators (KPIs) such as collection rates
  • reporting requirements such as performance data, issue resolution data

Our experts can provide feedback on your requirements specification and other tender documents, to ensure you cover all the important information and structure it in a way that helps suppliers create their bid.

Tip 3: Incorporate social value into your quality questions

The healthcare industry’s climate footprint is equivalent to 4.4% of global net emissions. If the health sector were a country, it would be the fifth-largest emitter on the planet. Procurement plays a big part in incentivising greener solutions, enabling the UK to achieve net zero emissions by 2050.

By incorporating social value into your requirements specification and quality questions, it encourages suppliers to invest in more environmentally friendly equipment and technology. Newer equipment with more advanced technology is more efficient, more reliable and has greater potential for waste-to-energy opportunities.

CCS can help you to form your quality questions to bring out the supplier that best meets your requirements.

Tip 4: Give plenty of time for your procurement

This is important for any procurement, but particularly medical waste due to its potential complexities. Creating your procurement timeline is one of the first steps you should take. Start with the proposed service start date and work backwards. 

Give ample time for suppliers to ask clarification questions and write their bid. This means suppliers will have sufficient time to assess their waste processing capacity and match their service with your requirements.

CCS can provide example timelines and help you to develop your own, factoring in time for document creation, tender launch, clarification questions, evaluation and consensus, any internal approvals, standstill (if applicable), contract award and mobilisation.

Even if you’re in the very early stages of preparation for your medical or hazardous waste procurement, it’s worth contacting us so we can add it to our procurement pipeline and provide early support. If you’ve had conflicting priorities and don’t have much time for your tender exercise, again please contact us so we can provide support.

Let us bring power to your procurement

Our Building Cleaning Services agreement offers you a flexible way to source medical and hazardous waste services that suit your organisation’s needs, wherever you are in the UK. To find out more and take your next step:

  • Get in touch via our online form quoting ‘RM6130 Building Cleaning Services’ and a member of our expert team will be in touch.
  • Alternatively, you call call us on: 0345 410 2222

RM6174 and RM6175 feedback survey

CCS is hosting a number of webinars in relation to RM6174 Multifunctional Devices, Print and Digital Workflow Software Services and Managed Print Service Provision and RM6175 Records Information Management, Digital Solutions and Associated Services. 

We are looking for feedback to ensure our content continues to provide value. We’d like to invite customers  who’ve used either of the frameworks to complete a short survey about their experience, which can be found below:

  • RM6174 -Multifunctional Devices, Print and Digital Workflow Software Services and Managed Print Service Provision
  • RM6175 – Records Information Management, Digital Solutions and Associated Services

Help evaluate our new software solutions agreement and benefit from continuing professional development credits

We are now only a month away from releasing our tender for the new Vertical Application Solutions agreement which will replace Data and Application Solutions (DAS). It will offer a range of sector-specific software solutions for the public sector: from local authority customers to police and emergency services, education, community health and social care.

This presents an opportunity for the public sector to help evaluate the bids from software suppliers. Getting involved will give your organisation the chance to shape the award of the framework to ensure it meets your needs, while evaluators can use the experience to earn continuing professional development (CPD) credits.

Evaluators for this procurement would benefit from having experience in using the DAS agreement or a background in procurement or contract management for technology-based solutions for their sector.

We’d love for you to be involved, so if you’re interested in becoming an evaluator, please register your interest by emailing us at technologysolutions@crowncommercial.gov.uk, clearly stating ‘RM6259 evaluator’ in the email subject and one of our team will be in touch.

How to carry out early market engagement successfully

NB: This article was originally published on 30 June 2022. All information was correct at the time of writing, but may not be fully applicable following the introduction of the Procurement Act 2023.

Early market engagement provides the foundation for a successful procurement by helping buyers make fully informed decisions.

What is “early market engagement”?

Early market engagement (EME), also known as soft market testing, is the process of engaging with potential suppliers before you begin buying goods or services for your organisation. It gives suppliers the opportunity to both inform the specification and to get ready to meet the demand.

Taking the time to carry out EME and gather market intelligence is regarded as ‘best practice’ and recommended as part of the preparation process for any future contract, especially where procurements are complex or of significant value.

Why should you talk to suppliers before you buy?

EME enables you to ask suppliers questions on important issues or decisions which will help you to refine your requirement. It can help you gain a better understanding from the market about what is possible, for example what resources (such as staff, products or equipment) would be needed to fulfil a contract. 

Imagine procuring a very specialised asset or building, say a community swimming pool – EME could help you to understand the particular technical requirements of the project, as well as supplier interest and capacity. Suppliers should be able to give you a number of best practice examples to help you when designing your facility. For example, they may be able to advise you on which pool tiles to choose to maximise safety and thermal performance. They may also help you to identify suitable pool types and discuss any technical design issues you have ahead of putting your project out to tender.

EME also increases awareness and interest in your potential procurement and encourages competition, meaning that you will have more suppliers, products and services to choose from when you’re ready to tender.

EME can help you to:

  • openly and transparently discuss “the problem” and possible solutions
  • write clearer requirements to include in your specification and business case
  • encourage competition and ensure a good number of applications
  • gain a better understanding at an early stage of how much a contract could cost and how long it could take
  • explore any opportunities for delivering aspects such as innovation, social value or carbon net zero

How and when to talk to suppliers?

It’s a myth that it’s unethical to talk directly with suppliers about your requirements before launching a formal procurement process. 

You can engage with the market at any time as long as you comply with the Public Contracts Regulations 2015, specifically Regulation 40 which states that ‘preliminary market consultation may be used in the planning and conduct of the procurement procedure, provided that it does not have the effect of distorting competition’. 

In practice, this means that you must ensure you don’t give any supplier a competitive advantage and that you must:

  • be open and transparent
  • maintain commercial confidentiality (such as respecting Intellectual Property Rights)
  • keep a record of discussions
  • ensure a process that is fair to ALL suppliers throughout the process
  • make suppliers aware that any resulting procurement will be conducted competitively

To be most effective, EME activities should begin at the concept stage. 

How to identify suppliers to engage with​​

There is no ‘right’ number of suppliers to speak to, and more isn’t necessarily better. As a general rule you should aim to speak to a wide range and mix of suppliers to represent a reasonable sample of the sector. 

If you have chosen to purchase through a framework, it is usually possible to carry out EME with the approved suppliers listed, as long as this has been specified as allowable by the Public Buying Organisation (PBO) responsible for the framework. 

For lower value or one-off purchases, for example if you are a school purchasing sports equipment, some simple internet research should be sufficient to identify potential suppliers. 

Remember that EME costs suppliers time, effort and money; they need to feel that this investment could be worthwhile, so try to keep the process proportionate to the scale and value of the project.

How to carry out early market engagement

It’s your responsibility as a buyer to decide how you’re going to run the EME process. For particularly sensitive or complex projects, you should seek commercial or legal advice before you start.

The more detail you can give to suppliers about your requirements the easier it will be for them to provide a thorough response. As a minimum, they would expect to know:

  • the background to your organisation and project
  • what you want to achieve from the contract
  • the location of the contract and an indication of timescales / duration
  • the dates for the conclusion of the EME process and for the submission of any information by suppliers

Obtaining information from suppliers

Processes that can be used to engage with the market vary from the transactional, such as emailed questionnaires, surveys or 1-2-1 meetings, through to more complex and collaborative supplier webinars, conferences or workshops.

CCS has a free eSourcing tool you can use for running procurements under our agreements. Using an eSourcing tool also allows you to ask suppliers questions in advance of a webinar or conference call with them in a more formal way that ensures transparency. 

The procurement process following EME

Once you’ve completed the EME process it’s essential that any information obtained does not unduly influence the procurement process that follows, for example that it:

  • is not used to discriminate for / or against any suppliers such as small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), for example by writing your requirements in a way that unfairly excludes a particular supplier or favours one specific supplier
  • has not been acquired under “false pretences”, e.g. you shared information about your requirements with one supplier that you didn’t share with another supplier
  • could breach supplier commercial confidentiality

Finally, following the market engagement process it’s important to let potential suppliers know that you’ve heard and responded to feedback. Not only will this improve the market interest in the procurement process for the specific project, it will also encourage higher levels of engagement in future market engagement processes.

Find out more

Download our latest digital brochure for the latest information on our agreements and how we can help you add power to your procurement.

More: You can now find all of our Procurement Essentials articles in one place on our website. 

New and improved payment solutions coming soon

Whether it’s a cost effective, secure and efficient way to pay for goods and services, or a way to issue funds quickly to civilians, our new Payment Solutions 2 agreement will have you covered. 

In response to customer and market feedback, we are pleased to confirm that procurement cards (purchasing cards – physical and virtual), prepaid cards and vouchers will all be available through the new agreement.  

With both direct award and further competition options, the agreement will make it even easier for you to access the solutions you need.

It is expected to be available from December 2022.

Find out more about the fantastic range of features and benefits Payment Solutions 2 will offer.

Cumbria County Council develops open source website publishing platform to help local authorities deliver digital transformation

Background

Using a grant from the Local Digital Collaboration Unit’s Local Digital Fund, Cumbria County Council took on the lead role for the beta phase of the LocalGov Drupal project.

LocalGov Drupal is a community of developers, content designers and digital leaders from local councils across the UK. They have collaborated to develop a best practice, open source website publishing platform that is freely available to all UK councils, creating public digital assets for the benefit of all.

The community aims to create sector-wide digital transformation by developing a shared pool of code, resources, research and expertise, helping councils to deliver the best possible digital experience for citizens, and to reduce the risks and costs associated with developing council websites. 

The solution

Throughout the development of the LocalGov Drupal project, the team has consistently used our Digital Marketplace to identify and procure the innovative technology suppliers they needed to deliver different aspects of the project.  

The marketplace enables public sector buyers to find technology or people for their digital projects quickly, easily, and efficiently. Users are able to access everything from data centres to cloud hosting to individual technology specialists such as developers or user researchers. 

As Project Lead, Will Callaghan explains.

The Digital Marketplace enables us to undertake a quick and simple procurement exercise. It’s easy to use, the shortlisting process is clear and we have always received good submissions from suppliers.

Challenges

Working with the multiple stakeholders and partners involved in the project has meant reconciling many different perspectives and requirements. Using a tried and tested solution like the Digital Marketplace, with a range of pre-approved suppliers available, provided the project team with a high level of confidence that they would be able to secure good outcomes. The alternative route of conducting an open market procurement was perceived as riskier and a potential drain on project resources which could instead be concentrated on getting the best possible result and delivering at pace.

The outcome

The LocalGov Drupal project can now count 28 councils and 8 suppliers among its growing community. The project has built a reusable council website codebase that can be set up in days instead of months and can evidence an 80% saving on development costs for a typical council website. With the latest funding from the Local Digital Fund, the team is working on microsite functionality that councils can use to create any spin-off website that they may need.

May-N Leow, Head of the Local Digital Collaboration Unit, said”

The LocalGov Drupal project is redefining how local authorities can partner with suppliers to deliver open source solutions with a business and operating model that not only gives councils ownership of what is developed but leverages suppliers to offer different levels of platform hosting and service.

Cumbria County Council itself has gained significant benefits from the project with Simon Higgins, Assistant Director of Customer and Community Services commenting:

The impact of LocalGov Drupal on our website and operations has been huge. We’ve started to see customer focused content and design that allows residents to access services and complete their business far faster than they could before.

To find out more visit the LocalGov Drupal website.

How we can help you

To find out more about how the Digital Marketplace and our other technology solutions could help to support your digital transformation projects, you can:

Barts NHS Trust use our Spend Analysis and Recovery Services solution to reclaim £100,000

The requirement

Barts Health NHS Trust sought an accounts payable review to identify and recover overpayments that had escaped its own robust internal systems and processes. 

The Trust processes a high volume of supplier invoices and conducts self-checks, regularly undertaking reviews with the National Fraud Initiative (NFI).

However, the Trust understood that overpayments are not always recognised or voluntarily declared by suppliers and that precious funds can be lost permanently if left unclaimed or if the supplier goes into liquidation. 

An accounts payable review is a risk-free mechanism to identify and recover any overpayments that have been missed through conducting an in-depth and thorough analysis of accounts payable transactions and payments.

As this is a time-consuming and resource intensive process to conduct in-house, Barts sought specialist support. 

The solution

Barts Health NHS Trust used the CCS Spend Analysis & Recovery Services solution to award their contract to Rockford Associates Limited.

Rockford first extracted 3 years of transaction data from the Trust’s accounts payable system. The process was easy and straightforward and no scripting or software development was required. The data was quickly uploaded to the supplier’s secure share file site and they then used their own data mining software to conduct the initial analysis.

A Senior Recovery Auditor was sent to the trust to deliver a full end-to-end review. With access to mail, systems and scanning, the auditor identified, verified and recovered a number of overpayments. 

The review consisted of a statement review together with a detailed analysis of Rockford’s bespoke software-generated reports. The service was delivered both on-site and remotely with minimum disruption to the Trust’s accounts payable and finance teams.

The Trust had previously used the services of Rockford in 2013 and it was further reassured that it could again easily engage Rockford’s specialist NHS AP Recovery Services through our Spend Analysis and Recovery Services solution.

The results

The Trust’s approach to financial transparency yielded positive results:

  • The supplier analysed over 645,000 past transactions from the Trust’s Oracle Finance System. 
  • The review identified, verified and recovered 82 exceptions, delivering a 6 figure sum which translated into more investment in patient care and services.
  • The Trust welcomed Rockford’s independent validation and positive reassurance that 99.99% of transactions were processed correctly by invoice value and 99.98% by invoice volume.
  • A detailed Findings and Recommendations report was produced to help prevent future overpayments
  • Rockford further identified 11,847 inactive suppliers, assisting the Trust to maintain an accurate supplier database 

Jasmine Lee, Associate Director Financial Services, Barts NHS Trust, said:

Barts NHS Trust is committed to ensure high standards of corporate governance and personal behaviour are maintained in the conduct of the business of the Trust. A main selling point of the service was that Rockford did the legwork in getting the cash physically back for us. That was a valuable resource to us. The engagement provided an independent reassurance and positive validation that our systems and processes are working well. The review was delivered promptly and efficiently with minimum disruption to day-to-day business productivity. We will happily recommend Rockford’s Accounts Payable review to any NHS Trust or other body considering a review.

Ray Dorney, Director, Rockford Associates Limited, said: 

The outcome with Barts NHS Trust is rewarding for both parties. Our relationship has spanned a decade or more and has always proved mutually beneficial. The Trust’s professional approach to financial transparency and the behaviours supporting that process has resulted in significant cash recoveries via Rockford’s specialist NHS accounts payable recovery review.

Get involved

Our Spend Analysis and Recovery Services solution, available under lots 15-19 of our Debt Resolution Services agreement, offers the public sector a chance to recover money and put it to use.

Find out how we can help you: