HA seeks 'confidence' in bidders for ECI schemes

The increasing number of changes made to delivery teams after contracts are awarded on major highways projects has forced the Highways Agency (HA) to change its tender process for the forthcoming early contractor involvement (ECI) schemes.
Following reports that winning bidders were breaking up delivery teams as soon as six months after winning major works, concerns were raised over the quality of long-term delivery. The HA is now focusing on a new 'confidence submission'.
Peter Higgins, director of the HA's procurement consultant PD Consult, said contractors would now be expected to deliver a quality submission with evidence of successful delivery in the past.
"We have been made aware of the issue of changing faces in delivery teams after contract award and we have slightly changed our approach to ensure that a relationship of trust can be developed with the HA."
Higgins said bidders would now be asked to prepare 75 A4 pages explaining how the agency can have confidence in it to achieve its objectives.
The submission, which will outline the bidders' proposed approach for the contract, will include a risk management schedule that will take into account risk across the whole project. It must align itself to the HA's six Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).
Although all ECIs are based solely on quality and not price, tenderers will also be asked to submit a fee value and its breakdown. This should not exceed the HA's baseline profit figure of 2.5%.
Bidders will also be expected to give evidence that their proposals have been successful on other contracts.
The two areas will be marked from one to ten (a score of one being the weakest) against the six HA KPIs.
Higgins said the HA would take the lower of the two overall marks to give what he called "confidence" to the agency.
A lead bidder will be announced to all those in the running for the work after the assessment of the quality submission.
However, the validation of the evidence element of the tender submission could see the result changed if the evidence doesn't support the bid teams' claims.
Tenders can also be rejected if the quoted fee for the contract is not justifiable.