To think that taxpayers should know about civil service procurement contracts

[Atlanticwinds]

This topic has always made me so uncomfortable and extremely annoyed but today I nearly lost the plot. I’m a civil servant working in a department that deals with public protection. The government sends us millions every year to run the “business” including salaries, housing of the service users, food, healthcare, personal development…etc. We’re a small department made of 4 middle managers and are given less than £7000 per year to use on providing good service and support. This is nowhere near enough and we’re always waiting for the next financial year. We spend hours per month shopping around to make sure that we spend that funding wisely and our service users benefit from it as much as possible, however many times the budget approver declines the purchase request because we are using a different provider than the ones we’re contracted with. They won’t let us buy anything from anyone else as apparently they will be fined. The contractors charge stupidly high prices and definitely aren’t good value for money.

Last week we submitted a request for 150 units from online sellers at a total cost of £1355. This is just under £10 per unit which is brilliant and it means our service users will have the items before Christmas and we still have some more money to spend on other things. The approver declined the purchase and asked us to use the contracted provider charging £27.50 per the SAME unit which is totalling £4125 and £20 delivery fee (the cheek of it!!). We are deflated and feel so let down by this corrupt system as this means that we can only buy for 54 service users and the rest will have to wait until the next budget is received next May.

Our service users are mainly people from very deprived backgrounds, with complex mental health issues, traumas and addictions. How can you keep on making cuts to save money and yet sign contracts with wealthy businesses that are constantly salivating over profits? AIBU to think that these contracts should end and we should be allowed to shop around given the tight budgets that we’re given?

@Morph22010 You even get this crap in the private sector. When I worked at Carrillion I looked after engineers doing gas and electrical repair and maintenance. One branch of a client had their staff room fridge fail. So engineer takes a day out of schedule work (Highlands of Scotland) to confirm fridge is dead. I then order a new fridge from our approved supplier who charges way more than the Currys price. It was at least delivered but the branch won't plug it in and shove it back under the counter. Nope our engineer takes another day out to do that for them.
It was such stupid contracts that sent Carrillion down the toilet.

We used to respond to proposals and submit tender offers on a regular basis for those where we could offer the service requested. We got frustrated at the level of deception required to get through to the initial stages. The procurement teams must know what's going on.

What do you mean by "the level of deception" exactly?

(That sounded a bit snarky - it wasn't meant to, I'm genuinely interested to know what you've seen)

As am I.

A lot of these are examples of bad procurement and contract management though. Who on earth on your commercial team is accepting a £40 increase for travel through London?

I've worked in many a public sector commercial role. The one place where suppliers take the absolute piss and fleece customers is the NHS. If Wes Streeting can sort out NHS efficiencies he deserves a knighthood. He's going the right way in making Chief Execs accountable. They're not held accountable for anything at the moment.

I also agree with PP re Donald Trumps public sector overhaul. We need it here too - so many people who have worked their way up the chain through longevity rather than talent. I think it's coming though, Labour made several nods to it in their manifesto.

There are no proper budget controls with State contracts. I am being serious when I say this.

A quote for the Civil Service will be nowhere near as tight as a quote for the private sector. If you think NHS contracts are a problem, just wait until you see defence contracts.

The difference is shareholders demand their Directors run companies economically. The Treasury is really lax by comparison.

Hi OP, you might find your contract has a benchmarking clause, or terms that state they can only apply a margin of x%. If not, at the very least it’s worth contacting your supplier and showing them the price difference and remind them that they’re receiving from the public purse and you need them to do better.

Sorry, I was replying sarcastically to the poster I quoted - I absolutely believe that is not all you're doing!

Senior managers will always refuse to challenge or intervene ...

And that's your answer to why the public sector "always gets a bad deal", @Atlanticwinds; nobody cares about being responsible for what's spent because it's not "their" money ... though the endless kickbacks may well be

Our own local authority has used the same maintencnce company for over 30 years, and apart from prices being several times anyone else's they're guaranteed to build faults into any work they do to engineer repeat visits/billing

This is how £20,000 (no that's not a typo) came to be spent on an internal door for our community facility, and that was faulty too, but never mind ... they still pay generous fees to a number of councillors as "consultants", so that's okay

DH is a commercial contract specialist and has worked on many big government IT contracts. The amount of money wasted in that area could run a small country for a year.

The issue is, some people can justify the rationale as you’ve outlined. It’s sensible. However, it still doesn’t necessarily equate to ‘value for money’. Some people have a comfort factor that ticking all the boxes means, on average, good value whilst mitigating risk.

I disagree.

At some level, senior management, and I guess that means up to Wes Streeting and co, that we need to view risk differently.

The rules of 20+ even, 10 or 5 years, ago no longer apply, yet we’re attempting to apply them to a global economy environment with organisations with agile needs. It needs an overhaul.

But you can't see it like meh it's only £3k difference, it is 4 times the cost and it's costing the tax payer, imagine if every public service could be run at a quarter of the current costs...

💯

I’ve worked at start-ups that have gone on to be hugely successful businesses. The mindset that a 4x difference is ‘immaterial’ is completely alien to me and says it all. And not it’s just about the price. Those companies don’t grow by having poor quality products with dodgy supply chains.

Another thing that really grinds my gears about all this is when any authority spending tax payers money claims commercial confidentiality to avoid telling the truth. Apart for national security type matters no contract should be off limits to the people whose money is being spent. It's a favourite of local councils to avoid answering tricky questions about how and why contracts are awarded by claiming this sort of crap.

Apart for national security type matters no contract should be off limits to the people whose money is being spent. It's a favourite of local councils to avoid answering tricky questions about how and why contracts are awarded by claiming this sort of crap.

Contracts should be published already. Under the new law, they will have to be. However there are always going to be areas exempt from that - government can't just publish the entire pricing and commercial model of a private company to all of a supplier's competitors, nor the IP/know-how in their solutions. That genuinely is commercially sensitive information and will continue to be redacted.

Only a small country, TonTonMacoute?

I'm only waiting for someone to link the usual reports "proving" how utterly efficient such bodies really are, as if anyone believes them in light of hard experience

And then it's wondered why current public employment involves an automatic rejection for some employers looking for real responsibility ...