Competitive Tendering for Professional Services

Part 1 Activities defined: sports and leisure management; theatres and arts facilities management; libraries management; parking management; architecture services; engineering services; personnel services; housing and property management; legal services; financial services; computer services; corporate and administrative services. Part 2 Contractor preparation for the CCT: general preparation; organization; training; business plans; quality assurance; management information systems; service level agreements; financial systems; reporting; personnel issues; submitting the bid - preparations for tendering, clarifying the tender documents, staff and trade union consultation, the bidding process, contents of the bid, financial services, support services, quality; golden rules of tendering. Part 3 The pre-tendering phase from the authority's viewpoint: how externalization sits alongside compulsory competition; preparing for white collar CCT - the authority's role, training, organization, management information systems, quality assurance, personnel implications, service level agreements; contract strategies - packaging of works into contracts, pricing, control over service providers. Part 4 The principles of tenderer selection and tender evaluation: legal framework; adopting a policy; choosing the tenderers - strategy, technical suitability, financial suitability, interviews; tender evaluation - compliance with conditions of tender, technical suitability, guarantees, health and safety issues, quality assurance, race relations, environmental issues, interviews and presentations, financial factors, loss leader bids; the decision. Part 5 What's needed in the documentation: specification; advertisement; questionnaire; instructions to tenderers; conditions - payment provisions, termination and default provisions, arbitration clauses, staffing matters, insurance and liabilities, variation clauses; pricing; ancillary documentation - performance bond, licence or tenancy agreement, covering letter, form of agreement, requirements of EC public procurement regime. Part 6 After the tender process: client administering the contract - implementation, variations, monitoring; contractor compliance - working under the contract, variations, working to budget, municipal trading, trading with the public sector, work for other authorities, working for the private sector; challenge - anti-competitive behaviour, contract compliance, challenge under CCT legislation, judicial review; transfer of undertakings regulations; inter-relationship with the EC public procurement regime.