12% off iPads: DFE /CCS bulk purchase programme

[psydii]

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/register-to-buy-tablet-devices-for-your-school

 

News story: Register to buy tablet devices for your school

 

DfE is facilitating a further procurement to allow schools to buy tablets using ‘collective buying power’, after the pilot saved 12% on the price. The procurement will be completed by the Crown Commercial Service (CCS).

 

Collective buying power allows a group to negotiate better discounts.

 

The procurement will offer 4 tablet options:

 

Apple iPad

Microsoft Surface Pro

LearnPad

a generic tablet

There will also be a number of associated items to choose from, eg security marking, covers and charging stations.

 

Register your interest in buying tablet devices

To register, email [email protected] by 6 May 2016 with:

 

your name

your school’s name

your contact details

an estimate of how many devices you need

How the procurement will work

We need schools to order a total of 500 devices for the procurement to go ahead. We’ll let registered schools know if we can’t run the procurement due to low order numbers.

 

If the procurement is agreed, CCS will publish forms to capture your school’s requirements, as well as providing a series of webinars and a helpline to help you with the application process.

 

The actual procurement will be completed for you - you won’t need to run it yourself.

 

DfE will continue to advertise the procurement after 6 May, which will hopefully encourage more schools to register, leading to more competitive prices.

 

The estimated timescales for the procurement are:

 

April/May - gather schools’ commitment and volumes

June/July - run procurement

July/August - schools will place orders and receive tablets

August/September - schools will pay the supplier

A representative from Bournville Primary School, one of the schools in the initial pilot, commented that:

 

“the process was simple and we were assured by the fact that we were purchasing from an approved supplier operating under the framework’s terms and conditions”.

[PotNoodleTech]

Very interesting!

[2ilent8cho]

Is that 12% off standard retail price? Because if you go to an Apple Education partner you normally get that kind of a discount anyway on a large order.

[psydii]

I expect that this is programme is there to enable institutions buying only 20-30 iPads have access to the levels of discount that large deployments get.

[Koldov]

Does anybody know how this works from a DEP perspective?

 

I am asking due to us wanting to get DEP sorted for our iPads, however we purchased them as an order with another school (for a bulk discount) and it is the other school that is registered with the seller. We're not sure how this relates to enrolling our school iPads into the program, as the PO did not come from our school...

 

Kol.

[Sylv3r]

I've ran the article a couple of times now over the last week or so. Does anybody know that expressing your interest ties you into having to purchase the device - we are still considering what device to purchase as a school over the summer, but wouldn't wish to sign up then have to make the purchase. It's an expression of interest, but they could get 100's of school signing up they then do all the work, then nobody purchases.