Section one: Contracting authority
one.1) Name and addresses
Department for Work and Pensions
Caxton House, Tothill Street
London
SW1H 9NA
Country
United Kingdom
Region code
UK - United Kingdom
Internet address(es)
Main address
https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-for-work-pensions
one.2) Information about joint procurement
The contract is awarded by a central purchasing body
one.3) Communication
Additional information can be obtained from the above-mentioned address
one.4) Type of the contracting authority
Ministry or any other national or federal authority
one.5) Main activity
General public services
Section two: Object
two.1) Scope of the procurement
two.1.1) Title
Synergy Business Process Services
two.1.2) Main CPV code
- 79400000 - Business and management consultancy and related services
two.1.3) Type of contract
Services
two.1.4) Short description
The Authority is seeking to engage the market to work with The Synergy Programme and its stakeholders to ensure the delivery of best in class, Value for Money (VfM), shared Human Resources (HR) and Finance business process service solution which meet the needs of service users.
The Synergy Programme has been established to bring together the individual Department plans in line with the Government Business Service (GBS) published Shared Services Strategy for Government: this includes building a common operating model, Business Process Services (BPS), single technology, and single commercial strategy.
The Synergy Programme comprises the following central Government Departments (Departments) and their ALBs.
• Ministry of Justice (MoJ).
• Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).
• Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA); and
• Home Office (HO).
DWP are currently the lead contracting authority for The Synergy Programme.
The prime driver of The Synergy Programme is to drive significant business transformation across four cluster Departments. The Synergy Programme, together with the successful suppliers will jointly develop a new Common Operating Model (COM) and introduce a new user-centric service including common data standards.
The COM design will continually evolve throughout the five programme delivery phases. As a result, benefits will also continue to evolve over time. This will help identify additional benefits for the Programme and provide more robust data and narrative to justify the current benefits profile.
To meet the objectives of The Synergy Programme it is envisaged that through investing in the development of a COM to drive a high level of convergence, the introduction of a high-performing, user-centric Synergy Shared Services Organisation (SSSO), more consistent and common data standards and seeking to exploit new functional capability will be achieved.
The COVID pandemic, and the challenging fiscal environment that has followed as a result, has heightened the drive and need for more effective and efficient delivery by all Government Departments. Key to this ambition will be the ability to capture, manage and improve the quality of Finance and HR (Human Resources) data to enable better informed decisions. The Synergy Programme will drive significant business transformation across four major Departments in support of this ambition. Additionally, the government has set out ambitious objectives to put sustainability at the heart of our government services. Greening government: ICT and digital services strategy 2020 to 2025 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) and Greening Government Commitments 2021 to 2025 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
The Synergy Programme has circa 250,000 employees between the Departments and has a commonality of currently using the same outsourced BPS Partner, Shared Services Connected Limited (SSCL).
SSCL provide the current technology solution the Single Operating Platform (SOP) shared by DWP, DEFRA and the MoJ. SOP is based on an Oracle eBusiness Suite 12.2.6 instance recently migrated from on premise to being hosted since October 2020 on a PaaS (Platform as a Service) Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI).
The Authority intends to undertake a procurement in-line with section II.2.4) Description of the procurement below. This prior information notice has been issued to seek pre-market engagement prior to Expressions of Interest (EoI) from the market. This pre-market engagement is to be structured across three sprints of pre-market engagement questions, addressing three procurement themes. The submission dates of which follows:
Sprint 1 (Strategy & Ambition): 5th-19th May 2023.
Sprint 2 (Theme TBC): 22nd May-2nd June 2023.
Sprint 3 (Theme TBC): 12th-30th June 2023.
Nothing in this prior information notice is intended to commit the Authority to a subsequent procurement.
two.1.5) Estimated total value
Value excluding VAT: £100
two.1.6) Information about lots
This contract is divided into lots: No
two.2) Description
two.2.2) Additional CPV code(s)
- 79000000 - Business services: law, marketing, consulting, recruitment, printing and security
two.2.3) Place of performance
NUTS codes
- UK - United Kingdom
two.2.4) Description of the procurement
The Authority intends to commence a transformation of existing business process services into a new Synergy Business Process Service solution (Synergy BPS).
The Authority proposes conducting a single procurement process to determine one best single supplier for the Synergy BPS. In addition, the current intent of the Synergy business case is that that supplier will be capable to support new business process services and SOP.
The Authority intends to engage with potential BPS suppliers with a view to:
• confirm a market exists to provide the Synergy BPS and technical support for SOP.
• to inform a proposed strategy and ambitions.
• to gauge initial feedback on the scope, risks and approach of the Synergy BPS in commissioning the new solution.
• further understand the proposed pricing and contractual model; and
• inform the procurement strategy to create the optimal approach from both a Synergy and market perspective and will deliver the intended outcomes.
The answers from the three sprint questions provided by potential suppliers will help the Authority determine the approach, solution and procurement route, which will all be at the discretion of the Authority.
The Authority will issue the sprint questions within the portal, where the Authority will review the answers and then can arrange an assigned one to one supplier session to be held via Microsoft Teams up to 17th May 2023. Sessions will be limited to 2 attendees per supplier who will be permitted to join the Microsoft Teams event and the final date and timings will be confirmed and communicated by the Authority as soon as possible upon submission of this PIN notice. This will provide a further overview of the opportunity and approach and an apportunity to clarify any points. Please refer to section VI.3) Additional information below for further instructions on how to register for the event.
Theme of Sprint 2 and 3 questions to be confirmed at release of the next set of questions. The theme and questions for Sprint 2 and 3 will be a progression of themes that develop from Sprint 1.
Following the final date of the submitted Sprint 3 questions, registered suppliers will then be asked to submit an EoI. Please refer to section VI.3) Additional information below for further instructions on how to submit an EoI. The EoI itself will give suppliers the opportunity to state their own respective interest.
We encourage potential suppliers to submit clarification questions before the three clarification questions window closes for each sprint (please refer to section II.1.4 above for exact dates), so that the Authority can prepare the information accordingly. Please refer to section VI.3) Additional information below for further instructions on how to submit a clarification question.
two.2.14) Additional information
The Authority intends to undertake a procurement in-line with section II.2.4) Description of the procurement above. This prior information notice has been issued to seek answers to pre-market engagement questions across three sprints, covering three procurement themes. Nothing in this prior information notice is intended to commit the Authority to a subsequent procurement.
two.3) Estimated date of publication of contract notice
28 September 2023
Section four. Procedure
four.1) Description
four.1.8) Information about the Government Procurement Agreement (GPA)
The procurement is covered by the Government Procurement Agreement: Yes
Section six. Complementary information
six.3) Additional information
Suppliers Instructions:
How to participate in this pre-market engagement:
1. Register on the eSourcing portal (this is only required once):
https://dwp.bravosolution.co.uk & click the link to register - Accept the terms & conditions & click 'continue' - Enter your correct business & user details - Note your chosen username & click 'Save'. You will receive an email with your password (keep this secure).
2. Once registered click on the following link for the pre-market engagement sprint 1 questions:
You will receive a notification via the portal at the start date of the release of the sprint 2 and 3 questions.
For further assistance please consult the online help, or the eTendering help desk.
DWP expressly reserves the rights (i) to use a reverse auction; (ii) to cancel the procurement at any stage; (iii) to not award any contract as a result of the procurement process commenced by publication of this notice; (iv) and in no circumstances will DWP be liable for any costs incurred by potential suppliers.
VI.4) Procedures for review
VI.4.1) Review body
VI.4.2) Body responsible for mediation procedures
VI.4.3) Review procedure
VI.4.4) Service from which information about the review procedure may be obtained
VI.5) Date of dispatch of this notice