PROCUREMENT AND SUPPLIES
One-stop solution for public sector procurement
Tim Williams, managing director of procurement specialist Millstream and its mytenders website, explains how a one- stop solution can make life easier for purchasers in the public sector.
E
nsuring best value for money is vital for any public sector organisation, particularly in times of recession.
Local
authorities, NHS trusts, transport operators and other public bodies are also bound by strict rules on procurement, which affect every purchasing decision made in the public sector.
Public procurement regulations apply to all public sector contracts over threshold values – starting at £113,000 – and are designed to ensure free and fair access to, and competition for, public sector contracts.
EU legislation means that contracting authorities must adhere to transparent and non-discriminatory principles when purchasing goods and services, while the regulations set down procedures and standards for choosing tenderers and awarding contracts.
All public contracts that are above the set threshold usually have to be advertised in the Offi cial Journal of the European Union (OJEU), through a contract notice.
These notices are published in the online version of the OJEU, Tenders Electronic Daily (TED). The English public sector’s database of low-value notices, Contracts Finder, and the Public Contracts Scotland portal also publish contract notices from TED.
A growing number of UK public authorities now handle tendering electronically in order to comply with the latest EU legislation – and crucially, save both money and time. Indeed, the European Union is proposing to make electronic tendering compulsory in the next few years.
As procurement specialists, Millstream runs mytenders, a tender publication and management service that enables public sector buyers to submit fully compliant UK and EU
44 | public sector executive Sep/Oct 12
tenders from just one source, ensuring a fully transparent procurement process.
mytenders is a simple, one-stop solution for purchasers, with more than 700 public sector organisations using the website to publish both low and high value tenders.
The mytenders team has extensive knowledge and considerable experience in providing a complete electronic tendering service, having worked with more than 11,000 public sector organisations since mytenders was launched in 2002.
Both large and small public sector organisations use the service, such as Northamptonshire County Council, Sheffi eld and Derby city councils, which use mytenders extensively, but it’s small district councils and NHS trusts that probably gain the most benefi t as they don’t always have full-time procurement staff.
Millstream developed the mytenders pro service to enable purchasers to manage the publication and procurement process in one place.
Features designed to make life easier include the ability to attach documents to notices for interested suppliers to download, to receive RFQ, PQQ or tender responses from suppliers electronically in a secure environment, to provide online clarifi cations and respond only once to questions, and invite selected suppliers to the second stage of a procurement process.
We also send clients’ notices on to the OJEU and Contracts Finder so as wide an audience as possible can see the tender notices.
mytenders was initially established for purchasing authorities to create tender notices for submission to the OJEU, and as electronic tendering has grown it has developed into the portal it is today where authorities can create, publish and manage both OJEU and non-
OJEU tenders.
We know the regulations can be complex so our notice creation tool is a simple way to publish your procurement notices and our additional functions allow you to manage your entire process online and in one secure environment.
You only need to publish your notices once with us and we can ensure they are forwarded to the OJEU or Contracts Finder – in fact, many organisations use mytenders simply to meet their requirements to publish on Contracts Finder as our interface is much easier to use.
As a purchaser you will also receive expert help and guidance from the mytenders support team who are there to make sure your tenders are published correctly and that you get the best out of the system, while making it as simple as possible.
Millstream also runs the Tenders Direct website, which allows private companies from all sectors throughout Europe who are seeking new business opportunities to identify business opportunities from the public sector.
As the only organisation to provide national public procurement websites for several European member states, we also run the portals for Ireland, Norway and Scotland.
We are always developing the service we offer clients to make sure it is as easy and quick to use as possible, while always complying with regulations.
With so many options and rules, mytenders makes procurement and purchasing decisions much simpler.
Tim Williams FOR MORE INFORMATION
T: 01224 650734 W:
www.mytenders.org
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76