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Council strategies and policies
Procurement - Information for suppliers
- How you find out about our contracts and tenders
- What we need from your company when responding to a tender notice
- How we award our contracts
- Support for local suppliers
We aim to work closely with our suppliers, whether through high value formal contracts or low value informal procurement arrangements.
How you find out about our contracts and tenders
We recommend that prospective suppliers check our contracts register to find details of our current contracts. Details of specific tenders relating to the contracts will be advertised in:
- the relevant trade press
- local and national press
- the publications Government Opportunities and Contrax Weekly
- the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) if the contract is tendered across the EU.
Tender advertisements will carry details of the contract, the closing date for application and a contact for enquiries. On application, a pre-qualification questionnaire may be issued to suppliers for tenders which are to be short-listed.
What we need from your company when responding to a tender notice
We apply three tests to companies looking to do business with us. These are legal, financial and technical.
Legal
- You must accept English law as the governing law of any contract and the jurisdiction of the English courts.
- You must be prepared to accept our contract conditions, although minor changes may be negotiated if in the interest of both parties.
- You must have no convictions for serious environmental offences, fraud, corruption, or other major breaches of the Companies Act.
Financial
- You must pass a financial check, based on your company's last two years audited accounts (unaudited accounts may be accepted in some cases).
- You must provide evidence of £10 million public liability insurance.
Technical
- You must provide two references for your company that we can contact.
- You must provide evidence of any quality standards held by your company.
- You must provide a company policy statement covering health and safety, environmental and equalities aspects of your business, which must meet legislative requirements.
How we award our contracts
Quotations and straightforward tenders for the supply of goods and services are normally awarded on lowest price, unless other conditions apply.
Tenders for contracts, however, will generally be awarded using a range of evaluation criteria including price and quality. This is known as the 'most economically advantageous tender'. This enables us to take account of commercial and non-commercial considerations.
Support for local suppliers
We aim to support local business through a number of initiatives:
- ensuring that consideration is given to small to medium enterprises (SMEs) within our electronic procurement projects
- ensuring that all tenders have evaluation criteria, so that there is consideration of factors other than lowest price alone
- offering constructive debriefing to all those who compete for contracts in order to help them become more competitive
- providing comprehensive information on our website, including all contracts and key contacts
- improving commercial flexibility within the rules and regulations that we work to
- reviewing and developing sustainable purchasing policies
- publishing our contracting requirements
- collaborative procurement with County, District and Borough Councils to capture more local business
- work towards providing free advice and assistance on compliance with statutory requirements relating to trading laws and advertising.
