09.01.18
CCS brings up contract notice for new £12bn SME-focused FM Marketplace
The Crown Commercial Service (CCS) has today issued a contract notice for its new FM Management Marketplace.
Using the terms of the new Public Sector Contract, this latest framework is aimed at cutting time and costs associated with procurement, while focusing on simplification and increasing opportunities available to small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
The CCS says this framework could be worth up to £12bn and will be awarded in two phases, with phase one allowing companies to bid on two of three specific lots.
The intention of this new marketplace is to reduce the number of pages of terms and conditions involved in smaller contracts with the government, making it easier for companies to get involved.
It will do this by removing information that is not relevant to a contract by either putting it online of cutting it out entirely.
In addition to improving the opportunities for SMEs through simpler processes, the CCS says it will make contracts “modular and written in plain English - making it easier for suppliers and public bodies to understand their responsibilities.”
Core terms for every contract are now 20 pages long, and although they will not change they can be added to with relevant extra modules that ‘plug in’ to the current contract.
Further information on the FM Management Marketplace can be found in this article written for PSE by John Kenny, head of workplace, commercial specialist (FM and Property) at the CCS.
Kenny explains the importance of a simplified system and the history of the marketplace itself, a project which the CCS has been working on jointly with Government Digital Service (GDS), the Government Legal Department (GLD) and private law firm DLA Piper.
Plans to simplify the contracts involved in procurement have been ongoing since July, prompted by complaints about the complicated manner of the previous terms and conditions, which some companies found prohibitive.
View the CCS procurement pipeline here.
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