Hi
We have been quoted around £14,000 to renew our Internet, Emails and filtering through the local authority. This seems very expensive to me for a 10 Meg line. What do others think, would be grateful for any feedback?
Thanks
Peter
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Hi
We have been quoted around £14,000 to renew our Internet, Emails and filtering through the local authority. This seems very expensive to me for a 10 Meg line. What do others think, would be grateful for any feedback?
Thanks
Peter
Sounds about right for a Grid for Learning connection. We had only the connection at 20Mb for similar money, as we host all the rest internally.
Ours is £16k for the same but with 100mb pipe to county/RBC, but around 10mb to the internet. I believe primaries get the same but with 10mb for around £10k
We're with BT and pay £8k per year for a 10mb connection. On top of that we use Smoothwall.
Prices vary wildly with geography - but it would certainly be worth talking to a few ISPs, that's the only way you'll know for sure.
100MB on NGN isn't?Quote:
Originally Posted by bodminman
If we were paying direct with an ISP like BT we'd be paying about £12.5k just for the fibre connection, then we'd have to provide filtering, email, etc...
With our LEA we pay about £4k for a 10Mbit line, as they top slice funding for the rest.
Just wondering if you know what the true cost of your connection is?Quote:
Originally Posted by localzuk
I am interested as we are in same position and top slicing means you are really paying a lot more, just wondered if your LA reveals the true cost?
Nope. We don't get told the true cost.Quote:
Originally Posted by sparkeh
Figures.Quote:
Originally Posted by localzuk
This is what really annoys me, how are we supposed to make best value procurements when we can't make reasonable comparisons against a range of suppliers?
The thing is, there's no way for us to get best value from anywhere else due to the way the pricing is done - ie. If we don't go with the LEA, we don't get whatever money they spend on the connection back, we just don't pay the £4k that we pay normally.Quote:
Originally Posted by sparkeh
It means, effectively, that we're tied to the LEA as there is simply no way we can justify the exta £8k spend.
So make a FOIA request?Quote:
Originally Posted by localzuk
Why? So they can say 'sorry, that is commercially sensitive information' and refuse it?Quote:
Originally Posted by pete
We're in a 4 year deal with BT for this bugger!
One year down 3 to go!
They don't get to decide that it's commercially sensitive and if they do attempt to use that exception, they have to show how they've balanced that against benefit of disclosure. They're .gov.uk - how they spend our money is a matter of public record and Suffolk (for example) answered in full a FOIA request asking about ICT contracts, including broadband costs and providers in August 2010 (http://www.suffolk.gov.uk/NR/rdonlyr...closureLog.pdf - page 3 or 4) so there's your precedent.Quote:
Originally Posted by localzuk
If it's not commercially sensitive for them, it isn't for Somerset, who make a top-level breakdown of the budget available here: SAP NetWeaver Portal. It's simply a case of ensuring the request gets to a person who knows they can't just blow off the request and/or complaining to ICO if they do.