Procurement of MIS Systems - Dispelling a few myths

[NotAGeek]

I have considerable experience leading the procurement function of a local authority - with a focus on education. Just wanted to add some points of clarification following some recent threads I saw:

 

1. It is true what some authors have said about moving from server-based software to cloud-based software not being a simple 'upgrade' or contract variation. This becomes a material change to the product purchased by the school(s) and should be the subject of a new procurement. This could be via a framework as opposed to you undertaking an exercise yourselves
   
2. When thinking about your procurement strategy for MIS, you mustn't define MIS as a bronze (simple, low value, low risk) contract. You can search for the 'Contract Tiering Tool' from the Knowledge Hub for help with defining gold, silver, bronze contracts.
   
3. This will have a knock-on effect on how you undertake the financial assessment of bidders and suppliers. And it should mean that you will not rely purely on delphi scores from credit referencing agencies and you should undertake a full assessment. You can also search the Cabinet Office's assessing the economic and financial standing of suppliers for a guide on how to do the financial assessment. If you do not have the in-house expertise to do this, you can buy-in support.
   
4. You assign a weighting to price. This normally depends on your assessment of how 'standardised' the good is - the more standardised the good (say taxi services, or waste collection) the heavier weighting you would assign to price. The less standardised (say alternative provision for pupils at risk of exclusion) the heavier weighting you would apply to quality. You can find advice online about how to decide price/quality ratios on government websites and from legal firms experienced in public services. If you see 2-3 recent tenders for MIS's and they have applied consistent price/quality ratios, it's probably safe to assume it has been well thought through
   
5. Some frameworks will have undertaken the financial assessment of suppliers, but some will not have, so you need to check the particulars of the framework you're considering.
   
6. An obvious point - but you need to be very transparent and very fair. Don't put yourself in a position where you could subconsciously favour a particular supplier. Or a position where you leave yourself open to challenge from unsuccessful suppliers. For example, if you are part of a group of schools, and a prospective bidder is already delivering in some of your schools so they have access to staff, make sure they do not receive any more information about the upcoming tender than other prospective bidders. Try not to accept any freebies from suppliers and don't allow relationships with contract managers to become more than just professional (barbecues, lunches, holidays - it happens more than you would think!)
   

 

 

I'm happy to try to clarify any further procurement queries.

Edited October 20, 2020 by NotAGeek

[synaesthesia]

I raise an eyebrow in wonderment.

[NickBryson]

I have considerable experience leading the procurement function of a local authority - with a focus on education. Just wanted to add some points of clarification following some recent threads I saw:

 

1. It is true what some authors have said about moving from server-based software to cloud-based software not being a simple 'upgrade' or contract variation. This becomes a material change to the product purchased by the school(s) and should be the subject of a new procurement. This could be via a framework as opposed to you undertaking an exercise yourselves
   
2. When thinking about your procurement strategy for MIS, you mustn't define MIS as a bronze (simple, low value, low risk) contract. You can search for the 'Contract Tiering Tool' from the Knowledge Hub for help with defining gold, silver, bronze contracts.
   
3. This will have a knock-on effect on how you undertake the financial assessment of bidders and suppliers. And it should mean that you will not rely purely on delphi scores from credit referencing agencies and you should undertake a full assessment. You can also search the Cabinet Office's assessing the economic and financial standing of suppliers for a guide on how to do the financial assessment. If you do not have the in-house expertise to do this, you can buy-in support.
   
4. You assign a weighting to price. This normally depends on your assessment of how 'standardised' the good is - the more standardised the good (say taxi services, or waste collection) the heavier weighting you would assign to price. The less standardised (say alternative provision for pupils at risk of exclusion) the heavier weighting you would apply to quality. You can find advice online about how to decide price/quality ratios on government websites and from legal firms experienced in public services. If you see 2-3 recent tenders for MIS's and they have applied consistent price/quality ratios, it's probably safe to assume it has been well thought through
   
5. Some frameworks will have undertaken the financial assessment of suppliers, but some will not have, so you need to check the particulars of the framework you're considering.
   
6. An obvious point - but you need to be very transparent and very fair. Don't put yourself in a position where you could subconsciously favour a particular supplier. Or a position where you leave yourself open to challenge from unsuccessful suppliers. For example, if you are part of a group of schools, and a prospective bidder is already delivering in some of your schools so they have access to staff, make sure they do not receive any more information about the upcoming tender than other prospective bidders. Try not to accept any freebies from suppliers and don't allow relationships with contract managers to become more than just professional (barbecues, lunches, holidays - it happens more than you would think!)
   

 

 

I'm happy to try to clarify any further procurement queries.

 

This post would be so much more helpful if you were to give your contact details and the LA team you lead. If not then perhaps clarify why you wish to remain anonymous. Thank you.

[djm968]

This is fine if you are procuring MIS for a single School or all of the Schools in a trust, if however you already have a preferred MIS supplier and are procuring the MIS for the rest of your Schools, the process that dictates that you have to go out to tender in this instance is flawed. Of course you are going to be biased towards one supplier and if you did chose another MIS, you might as well rip your ICT strategy up and throw it in the bin. Edited October 20, 2020 by djm968

[Primus]

This is fine if you are procuring MIS for a single School or all of the Schools in a trust, if however you already have a preferred MIS supplier and are procuring the MIS for the rest of your Schools, the process that dictates that you have to go out to tender in this instance is flawed. Of course you are going to be biased towards one supplier and if you did chose another MIS, you might as well rip your ICT strategy up and throw it in the bin.

 

Only if you look at it in this way. To flip this on its head, it's a good opportunity to test that your strategy really is the best it can possibly be by considering all the options fully and justifying through that process the option that is selected.

[djm968]

Only if you look at it in this way. To flip this on its head, it's a good opportunity to test that your strategy really is the best it can possibly be by considering all the options fully and justifying through that process the option that is selected.

I'm pretty sure if you are going out to tender for a MIS you would have already have tested your strategy rigorously.

[Primus]

I'm pretty sure if you are going out to tender for a MIS you would have already have tested your strategy rigorously.

 

The tender is part of the process of that though, for you to select the best product you have to use a methodology and the tender is part of that.

[Ditto]

Why is it the case that 1. is true? Who decided that? Is it enshrined in law or more a recommended practice based on general laws around public financing?

 

If a school moves SIMS from local servers to hosted, is it also true? I believe a library management system was moved from local to web based, but was (in theory) functionally the same. Does that count as a 'material change' - is there a definition of such a thing?

 

You mention this is from you experience for LA procurement. What's the situation for state schools that go their own way. What about academies, both single and MATs. Do the same rules apply - at the end of the day, it's all public money, just some not routed via LA. What about independents - can do they pretty much what they like?

 

A couple more questions for a specific scenario. A school that I am a governor at, went standard alone academy a good few years ago (6+). In the last couple of years they joined a MAT. Throughout, they have continued to use and get support for SIMS via the old LA provision. Should those renewals have gone through formal procurement? (I wished they did, but that's a personal opinion!). Related, could keeping the same software and it's familiarity to staff be a determining factor and have a heavy weighting?

[djm968]

The tender is part of the process of that though, for you to select the best product you have to use a methodology and the tender is part of that.

Only if you tendering the first time for an MIS, if you have already gone through the tendering process once and procured an MIS that fits your ICT strategy, your strategy must be sound.

[Primus]

Only if you tendering the first time for an MIS, if you have already gone through the tendering process once and procured an MIS that fits your ICT strategy, your strategy must be sound.

 

If you are tendering again it is because circumstances have changed, what was right before may not be right now with the new circumstances.

[elsiegee40]

What about independents - can do they pretty much what they like?

 

 

They aren’t spending public money. They will follow their own procurement procedures.

 

But , most of them are charities and the Charities Commission will have rules that they will have to comply with and may well get involved if it seems that money isn’t being spent appropriately for the purposes of the charity (eg lining the Trustees pockets by having their own businesses win contracts)

[djm968]

If you are tendering again it is because circumstances have changed, what was right before may not be right now with the new circumstances.

Yes but that's irrelevant, what I was saying is that if you already have been through the process, and chosen your MIS provider and are happy with your choice, nothing has changed and your strategy has been tested and is sound, you then still have to go through the formal tendering process again to get your preferred MIS into your other Schools to ensure you are compliant with financial regs. Which IMHO is complete waste of public money.

[Zammo]

Yes but that's irrelevant, what I was saying is that if you already have been through the process, and chosen your MIS provider and are happy with your choice, nothing has changed and your strategy has been tested and is sound, you then still have to go through the formal tendering process again to get your preferred MIS into your other Schools to ensure you are compliant with financial regs. Which IMHO is complete waste of public money.

 

At the risk of going round in circles, just because a plan was sound for one academy does not mean it scales to 10 or 20

 

I appreciate you feel confident that your internal planning is sufficient to demonstrate good value, but where public money is concerned there has to be a transparent way of ensuring it is being spent fairly and in accordance with best practice. The idea that a public body could just say "Nah we aren't going to run a transparent tender on this one because we purchased SIMS for 5% of our users and that worked well so we'll just scale that up. And don't question us because we have a strategy and its stupid to think anyone could ever persuade us to change our mind"

 

The tender process, whilst having holes and weaknesses is far better than having a situation where public bodies can just buy whatever they like without proper scrutiny. And to allow proper scrutiny, you need a framework not just a 3 year old IT strategy document cobbled together by the Network Manager

[vikpaw]

Sounds reasonable but i'm getting this feeling of Déjà vu ...

[NotAGeek]

This post would be so much more helpful if you were to give your contact details and the LA team you lead. If not then perhaps clarify why you wish to remain anonymous. Thank you.

Hello and thank you for your comments.

Being new to Edugeek, that's how I thought it worked, with users remaining anonymous.

I have worked for an inner London LA for over 15 years but you don't need my contact info and credentials to corroborate what I say.

On point 1, all schools should have received a note from the DFE around Christmas 2018 saying that. If you don't recall receiving it, any experienced public sector procurement professional should be able to confirm. Especially one who is experienced in IT procurement.

On point 2, you can search the Contract Tiering Tool from the Knowledge Hub and apply the tool yourself. The Cabinet Office will confirm that the guidance is relevant for schools.

On point 3, you can search economic and financial standing of suppliers from the Cabinet Office and apply the guidance yourself. The Cabinet Office will confirm that the guidance is relevant for schools.

On points 4, 5 and 6 - any experienced public sector procurement professional could confirm. If you don't have access to one, your LA might have someone who could help. If that doesn't work, there are private organisations you could buy in. If you get completely stuck, write back to me and I can point you to a few professionals who might be able to help

[NotAGeek]

Why is it the case that 1. is true? Who decided that? Is it enshrined in law or more a recommended practice based on general laws around public financing?

 

If a school moves SIMS from local servers to hosted, is it also true? I believe a library management system was moved from local to web based, but was (in theory) functionally the same. Does that count as a 'material change' - is there a definition of such a thing?

 

You mention this is from you experience for LA procurement. What's the situation for state schools that go their own way. What about academies, both single and MATs. Do the same rules apply - at the end of the day, it's all public money, just some not routed via LA. What about independents - can do they pretty much what they like?

 

A couple more questions for a specific scenario. A school that I am a governor at, went standard alone academy a good few years ago (6+). In the last couple of years they joined a MAT. Throughout, they have continued to use and get support for SIMS via the old LA provision. Should those renewals have gone through formal procurement? (I wished they did, but that's a personal opinion!). Related, could keeping the same software and it's familiarity to staff be a determining factor and have a heavy weighting?

 

Hello and thank you for your comments.

 

The DFE confirmed that this is how the regulations should be interpreted so yes, as far as governance is concerned, it is something that schools 'must' do as opposed to 'should' do.

 

There is guidance on what constitutes a 'material change'. There could be some scenarios where applying/interpreting the guidance can be tricky in certain scenarios. But this is not the case when it comes to on-premise vs cloud software which has been the subject of specific clarification.

 

The same rules apply to academies, MAT's, and LA-maintained schools. Independent/private schools will have greater freedoms.

 

In the situation of your particular school and SIMS support, this is an interesting scenario. Because the LA is a public sector organisation, and the academy is a public sector organisation, there is greater flexibility with public-to-public relationships, so I would say your school is probably not breaking any rules. If you were purchasing SIMS support from a non-public organisation, then at the end of the contract for your support you would have to apply your own schools' buying rules as per your financial regulations.

 

I understand what you mean about familiarity, but I'm afraid that is never a valid reason to favour a particular supplier. It's not in the public interest for public sector organisation to purchase goods/services on the basis that they are familiar with them. Public sector workers should be willing to learn how to use new goods/services that could provide better value - this is especially true when we're talking about technology!

[vikpaw]

...

6. An obvious point - but you need to be very transparent and very fair. Don't put yourself in a position where you could subconsciously favour a particular supplier. Or a position where you leave yourself open to challenge from unsuccessful suppliers. For example, if you are part of a group of schools, and a prospective bidder is already delivering in some of your schools so they have access to staff, make sure they do not receive any more information about the upcoming tender than other prospective bidders. Try not to accept any freebies from suppliers and don't allow relationships with contract managers to become more than just professional (barbecues, lunches, holidays - it happens more than you would think!)

 

 

I'm happy to try to clarify any further procurement queries.

 

On this point on freebies from suppliers, what if they are giving away a product for a limited time? Surely, this could sway your decision to use them, gives them a foot in the door for a future tender, expose your school/group to risk of accusations of collusion, sharing confidential information, litigation... so it would be wise to avoid a free offering, particularly from someone other than your current provider?

 

Should you really consider the TCO of a free product too, and if its nominal value is sizeable do a tender process to compare against paid for products?

 

What if a supplier gives customers incentives to make positive public comments about them? This is a freebie right?

 

What MIS does your LA use? Have you conducted a tender for an MIS?

 

I hope my supplier is reading this bit about holidays as perks - the Maldives is opening up soon....

[djm968]

At the risk of going round in circles, just because a plan was sound for one academy does not mean it scales to 10 or 20

Definitely don't want to go round in circles, I get dizzy! But the OP was talking about MIS and I just think for something as critical as a MIS for your entire Trust, where you have already gone through the whole process, it makes no sense wasting public money loads of time going though the whole process again just to satisfy auditors because you want to migrate a dozen more Schools onto your preferred MIS, unless of course you are re-procuring for all Schools.

[localzuk]

A lot of this seems focused on organisations going to tender? Not all schools are going to have to tender for an MIS. They are just not all that big. I don't think our entire trust looking for a new MIS would be big enough to hit the EU tendering amount.

[Zammo]

A lot of this seems focused on organisations going to tender? Not all schools are going to have to tender for an MIS. They are just not all that big. I don't think our entire trust looking for a new MIS would be big enough to hit the EU tendering amount.

 

If your MAT is bigger than a couple of schools you would/should be going out to tender

 

The Academies Financial Handbook must be followed as part of your funding agreement, which states that "a competitive tendering policy is in place and applied"

 

As part of your MAT procurement and tendering policy you will have limits for low, medium and high value purchases. It varies slightly from MAT to MAT but the standard for High Value purchases is £40,000 at which point a tender is required

 

If you do not run a tender for high value purchases you will need to have a very good, well documented reason

[RootsSchImp]

I have considerable experience leading the procurement function of a local authority - with a focus on education. Just wanted to add some points of clarification following some recent threads I saw:

 

Welcome to edugeek @NotAGeek and thanks for these totally disinterested, genuine insights from your experience in the public sector - they've transformed how I think about a recent supplier's sour grapes money grab!

 

I look forward to hearing more from you on this subject.

 

Ed

[localzuk]

I understand what you mean about familiarity, but I'm afraid that is never a valid reason to favour a particular supplier. It's not in the public interest for public sector organisation to purchase goods/services on the basis that they are familiar with them. Public sector workers should be willing to learn how to use new goods/services that could provide better value - this is especially true when we're talking about technology!

 

I suppose it depends what you mean about "familiarity". The way you've written it makes it sounds like it is just an issue of a feeling. Except, it isn't - familiarity should more accurately be referred to as retraining costs. Retraining costs should definitely be included in any process (both initial capital cost for retraining, through training courses, and longer term access to training materials and ease of training affect the overall cost of a product).

If your MAT is bigger than a couple of schools you would/should be going out to tender

 

The Academies Financial Handbook must be followed as part of your funding agreement, which states that "a competitive tendering policy is in place and applied"

 

As part of your MAT procurement and tendering policy you will have limits for low, medium and high value purchases. It varies slightly from MAT to MAT but the standard for High Value purchases is £40,000 at which point a tender is required

 

If you do not run a tender for high value purchases you will need to have a very good, well documented reason

I suppose I wasn't very clear in my post last night. What I am more referring to is the fact that Trusts each have their own finance policy based on guidance from the EFSA/Academies financial handbook. The £40,000 amount you have mentioned is just that - guidance. It isn't what the law itself says. MAT finance policies may choose a different amount (indeed, many have actually set that amount at a lower level too). Of course, they would need to justify that, but if it is defined in their finance policy and complies with the law itself, and the EFSA have not said anything, I cannot see that it would be a problem.

 

Also, when going out to tender, this doesn't mean you must go to full open tender every time. A restricted tender can be run whereby the suppliers you wish to hear from are invited to tender rather than publishing a tender for all to reply to (imagine doing that for something like a batch of Chromebooks, you'd get dozens of replies, wasting everyone's time).

There is also the concept of a negotiated tender, when an open or restricted tender either didn't work or wouldn't work.

Edited October 22, 2020 by localzuk

[Ditto]

Welcome to edugeek @NotAGeek and thanks for these totally disinterested, genuine insights from your experience in the public sector - they've transformed how I think about a recent supplier's sour grapes money grab!

 

I look forward to hearing more from you on this subject.

 

Ed

Comes across a bit strong. I'm not sure if it is just me, but I sense an undercurrent to this thread. Perhaps the style of the original post is a little different to many on Edugeek, but then again some of the responses come across as antagonistic. Perhaps @NotAGeek you could confirm one thing for us all, whilst being able to remain anonymous. Can you confirm you have, an never have had any association with Bromcom or UL and have no interest to declare in the current challenge between those parties.

Edited October 22, 2020 by Ditto

[NotAGeek]

On this point on freebies from suppliers, what if they are giving away a product for a limited time? Surely, this could sway your decision to use them, gives them a foot in the door for a future tender, expose your school/group to risk of accusations of collusion, sharing confidential information, litigation... so it would be wise to avoid a free offering, particularly from someone other than your current provider?

 

Should you really consider the TCO of a free product too, and if its nominal value is sizeable do a tender process to compare against paid for products?

 

What if a supplier gives customers incentives to make positive public comments about them? This is a freebie right?

 

What MIS does your LA use? Have you conducted a tender for an MIS?

 

I hope my supplier is reading this bit about holidays as perks - the Maldives is opening up soon....

 

Hello and thank you for your comments,

Sorry for not being clear but my point on freebies was more about non-business freebies. For example, say you were a very intelligent person and supported the might Arsenal FC - and the supplier contact, who knew that you were an Arsenal fan, one day says they have a spare ticket to the next Arsenal match and they're happy to give it to you; no matter how tempting, you shouldn't accept! When it comes to business products where there is a clear benefit to your school/LA, and there is absolutely no future commitment to the supplier, then in many instances this is ok. Even if the suppliers are speculating about potential future business, as long as it isn't a personal benefit to you, it's normally ok. If you have a particular concern, do seek advice from a procurement/governance professional. Or post specifics here and I will do my best to help.

Regarding incentives and public comments, again this could be ok in many circumstances. Provided your comments are genuine and the incentives are proportionate and non-personal again.

The vast majority of the maintained mainstream schools in my LA use Capita's MIS and finance product. Along with a neighbouring LA, we were due to procure cloud services in the spring term but that is now delayed.

[NotAGeek]

A lot of this seems focused on organisations going to tender? Not all schools are going to have to tender for an MIS. They are just not all that big. I don't think our entire trust looking for a new MIS would be big enough to hit the EU tendering amount.

 

Hello there,

Tendering goes beyond simply OJEU tenders. Your own school's buying rules and public sector contract regulations will mean you will need to tender on much lower thresholds than the OJEU threshold. For example, any contract over £25k (total value) must be advertised on Contracts Finder. I'm sure(!) your own schools rules approved by the GB will say that even lower value contracts should be subject to a competitive process.