1. PLA: ISSUES IN EVALUATING PUBLIC SECTOR TENDERS Case Study Manchester Event, 21 June 2010

2. 4395703-11 The factual scenario… “No Butts” To recap: joint procurement by the Department of Learning and Healthier Britain Purchase of health education, marketing and advertising services to reduce smoking Three (geographical) lots, three contracts seems to have been envisaged But must be some degree of co-ordination to ensure cohesion at national level Financial cap of £5 million per region over life of contract 12 bids in, a mixed bag of different offerings Request for an “example” marketing campaign at the bidding stage An external Technical Panel (“great and the good”) to assist Evaluation Panel All three contracts go to Greenbacks Limited Red Star is one of the unsuccessful bidders and obtained by email a debriefing letter last Friday (18 June 2010)

3. 4395703-12 So, what do we think? On review of the contract award decision letter, what do we think about: the legitimacy of the evaluation process the adequacy of the debriefing next steps for (i) Red Star and (ii) Healthier Britain (if any)?

4. 4395703-13 Issues to discuss… On the information so far, seem to be possible issues around: three contracts have been awarded to one company (Greenbacks) scoring award criteria use of a presentation past experience Technical Panel Certain additional issues then emerge, which may well affect your viewpoint…

5. 4395703-14 Additional Issue (1) The evaluation stage was run in two phases. The first stage involved the authorities (i.e. the Evaluation Panel) considering the bids (though it is unclear as to whether they formally scored the bids then). An hour before the first meeting of the Evaluation Panel, Bob, an Executive of Healthier Britain who chaired the Evaluation Panel, thought it would be a good idea to provide the panel with some additional guidance notes for judging the bids. Everyone thought this was super helpful and used the notes when considering the bids.

6. 4395703-15 Additional Issue (2) The second stage involved selecting five bidders to give a presentation to the Technical Panel on their "mock-campaigns". This presentation was one of the award criteria though it is unclear as to whether the presentation and the Q&A session at the presentation fed into any of the other award criteria.

7. 4395703-16 Additional Issue (3) Red Star learns that one of the Technical Panel members, Harry, a trustee of TRASH!, is good friends with Greenbacks' CEO. They went to university together and play for the same local football team. Red Star also discovers that Greenbacks has worked on a very successful anti- obesity project with Healthier Britain before (three years earlier).

8. 4395703-17 Additional Issue (4) Greenbacks made no changes to the terms and conditions proposed by the authorities. However, Red Star marked up the contract to reflect its concerns with (i) an unfair unlimited indemnity on behalf of the authorities and (ii) the rates at which the third party supplier, Friedmans, is offering media purchasing (space/time) services. As a small company, Red Star was unable to agree to the amount of indemnity proposed and in relation to media purchasing believes that it will be able to negotiate lower rates from Friedmans or, otherwise, its own contractors. Red Star was marked down for these changes to the Ts & Cs

9. 4395703-18 Additional Issue(5) The presentation instructions in the ITT read "please deliver a two hour presentation giving further details of your mock-campaign". Red Star's CEO discussed their ideas in detail and proposed a couple of slogans for the campaign. Red Star has just learnt that Greenbacks' presentation included model television advertisements, posters, leaflets and internet adverts in fairly advanced form.

10. 4395703-19 Additional Issue (6) Red Star had planned to use PowerPoint slides during the presentation to illustrate its vision for the campaign and show a couple of ideas it had for campaign graphics. Unfortunately, the meeting room's projector was not working so Red Star could not use the slides. Red Star offered to reschedule the presentation, or to send the slides by email, but was told that this was not possible.