Tendering Support and Advice

Tendering Support and Advice...

The Scottish Government and the wider public sector spend over £11billion per year on goods, works and services. Their purchasing model aims to balance sustainability quality and price and offers huge opportunities for Social Enterprises and all third sector organisations to engage in a variety of ways to share part of this spend and ensure additional value accrues to their local communities as a result.

The value and scope of many of the tendering opportunities often appear outwith the ability of a single Social Enterprise or Third Sector Organisation. By collaborating with others in the sector working with the private sector as a sub-contractor many of these opportunities can come within reach.

A variety of support and resources exist to help organisations become part of this huge supply chain and offering not only opportunity and income to the organisation but the wider social and environmental benefits to the community.

City of Edinburgh Council...

With approximately 760 contracts, 1500 contracted suppliers, and third party spend of almost £685m in 2019/20 the City of Edinburgh council is a very large market and they are constantly looking for suppliers to extend their supply chain enabling them to deliver vital services to Edinburgh’s citizens and businesses.

The procurement department run monthly drop in sessions (listed in our events calendar) to assist and advise potential suppliers as well as publishing a quarterly newsletter outlining opportunities and further advice and support.

City of Edinburgh Council – procurement site, please see https://www.edinburgh.gov.uk/suppliers-contractors

P4P (Partnership 4 Procurement)...

P4P is funded by the Scottish Government (SG) to provide practical advice and guidance to individuals, organisations and groups of organisations to ensure they can build capacity to better secure contracts or funding.

The services they offer include:

Collaboration Support

Support to develop new partnerships or consortia to bid for larger contracts. This includes:
Partnership strategy development session(s); facilitating partnership meetings; a bespoke collaboration plan and support to compile a MoU or Partnership Agreement.

Tender Support

Support to become ‘tender ready’ Includes: support with completing any buyer documentation; compiling a partnership bid library and support to plan and draft bids for tenders

Procurement Healthcheck

P4P can work with you on the Procurement Healthcheck, a bespoke assessment and evaluation of your ‘tender-readiness’.

Social Enterprise Market Scanner

If you don’t have the time to carrying out research into upcoming procurement opportunities yourself, P4P can do the work for you by providing a tailored report setting out potential procurement opportunities.

Tender Ready Accelerator Programme

P4P offers a 4 week programme to help social enterprises or third sector organisations gain knowledge and understanding in procurement and tendering over a short time frame.

Most of these services are free to Social Enterprises and Third Sector Organisations.

P4P website, please see https://p4p.org.uk.

Public contracts information/registration...

Public Contracts Scotland

As mentioned above the Scottish public sector spends over £11 billion each year on goods, works and services. These contracts vary in size, value, complexity, type of contract and geographical area across Scotland and as a result there could be a number of opportunities you could bid for.

As public sector procurement officers spend taxpayers money there are strict rules on how they can buy goods and services. These rules vary depending on the type and value of the contract.

The Scottish Model of Procurement puts procurement at the heart of Scotland’s economic recovery: use the power of public spending to deliver genuine public value beyond simply cost and/or quality in purchasing. Their value for money triangle demonstrates a balance of sustainability, cost and quality. Public Contracts Scotland works with the public sector to develop strategic relationships with key business and Third Sector organisations.

You can gain access to this contract information simply by registering with Public Contracts Scotland. Registration is free and it allow you to see contracts both in your geographical area and within specialist goods and services which you may be able to provide or help to provide.

PCS registration, please see https://www.publiccontractsscotland.gov.uk/register/register_start.aspx

Public Contracts Scotland, please see https://www.publiccontractsscotland.gov.uk.

Case studies...

Collaborating to Bid – Peer Community of Practice Consortium

In December 2019 The City of Edinburgh Council published a Contract Notice on behalf of Edinburgh Health and Social Care Partnership and the Edinburgh Integration Joint Board through the Public.

Find out more, please see https://www.edinburghsocialenterprise.co.uk/collaborating-to-bid-peer-community-of-practice-consortium.

Collaborating to Bid – Edinburgh Young Carers Partnership

In November 2019 City of Edinburgh Council published the Edinburgh Carers Support tender. This had been proceeded by the publication of a Prior Information Notice and a number of events…

Find out more, please see https://www.edinburghsocialenterprise.co.uk/collaborating-to-bid-edinburgh-young-carers-partnership.