Public procurement notice: Contract Notice
Published: 2016-09-09
Buyer: NHS Blood and Transplant
Country: UK
Region: UNITED KINGDOM
Contract type: Services
Procedure: Open procedure
CPV classification: 33124110 | 33124130 | 33140000: Medical consumables | 33141625 | 33696500
Submission deadline: 2016-10-05
Award criteria: The most economic tender

Technical requirements: NHS Blood and Transplant is a Special Health Authority has 2 testing sites throughout England, collecting approximately 1 700 000 blood and platelet donations and approximately 8 000 tissue donations each year. The Authority requires a fully integrated microbiology managed equipment service for Hepatitis E virus (HEV) ribonucleic acid (RNA) NAT Testing. This includes the assay, fully automated equipment, consumables and data management software required to send final results to the Authority's information management system. The Authority requires a fully automated system which can meet the Requirements as set out in the Specification, found in the tender documents related to this notice. The Authority requires the successful Tenderer's system to be fully implemented, validated and carrying out testing at both of the Authority's sites no later than 3 months after contract award. Contract award is anticipated to be 9.2.2017.
NHS Blood and Transplant is a Special Health Authority, responsible for the provision of blood components and tissues and a range of associated specialist laboratory and patient therapeutic services to hospitals in England. The Authority operates at a local level through a network of Blood Centres but is structured nationally for managerial control with a single management team under its own Chief Executive Officer. The Authority has 2 testing sites throughout England, collecting approximately 1 700 000 blood and platelet donations and approximately 8 000 tissue donations each year. Within the Manufacturing and Logistics directorate of the Authority, the testing function performs a wide range of testing services; these include the large-scale molecular and serological screening of blood, tissue and stem cell donations for a range of infectious agents. The Authority requires a fully integrated microbiology managed equipment service for Hepatitis E virus (HEV) ribonucleic acid (RNA) NAT Testing. This includes the assay, fully automated equipment, consumables and data management software required to send final results to the Authority's information management system. Tenderers are required to respond to this ITT on the basis of offering a fully automated system which can meet the Requirements as set out in the Specification. The Authority requires the successful Tenderer's system to be fully implemented, validated and carrying out testing at both of the Authority's sites no later than 3 months after contract award. Contract award is anticipated to be 9.2.2017 and the current arrangement will be extended until implementation is complete.
Further background information and all details of the Authority's requirements for this system can be found within the tender documents available from the Authority's BravoSolution eSourcing Portal (https://nhsbt.bravosolution.co.uk).
Please also note that no guarantee is given as to the volume of HEV NAT Testing which may be required over the life of the contract or in any contract year.
Suppliers Instructions: How to Express Interest in this Tender: 1. Register your company on the eSourcing portal (this is only required once) — Browse to the eSourcing Portal: https://nhsbt.bravosolution.co.uk and click the link to register — Accept the terms and conditions and click ‘continue’ — Enter your correct business and user details — Note the username you chose and click ‘Save’ when complete — You will shortly receive an email with your unique password (please keep this secure); 2. Express an Interest in the Tender — Login to the portal with the username/password — Click the ‘PQQs / ITTs Open to All Suppliers’ link. (These are Pre-Qualification Questionnaires or Invitations to Tender open to any registered supplier) — Click on the relevant PQQ/ ITT to access the content — Click the ‘Express Interest’ button at the top of the page — This will move the PQQ /ITT into your ‘My PQQs/ My ITTs’ page. (This is a secure area reserved for your projects only) — You can now access any attachments by clicking ‘Buyer Attachments’ in the ‘PQQ/ ITT Details’ box; 3. Responding to the Tender — Click ‘My Response’ under ‘PQQ/ ITT Details’, you can choose to ‘Create Response’ or to ‘Decline to Respond’ (please give a reason if declining) — You can now use the ‘Messages’ function to communicate with the buyer and seek any clarification — Note the deadline for completion, then follow the on-screen instructions to complete the PQQ/ ITT — There may be a mixture of online and offline actions for you to perform (there is detailed online help available). You must then submit your reply using the ‘Submit Response’ button at the top of the page. If you require any further assistance please consult the online help, or contact the eTendering help desk.
‘Please Note the Following Important Instructions for Tenderers’. The Authority will be holding a site visit at each of its testing sites, to enable Tenderers to survey the space available for HEV RNA screening and its associated storage requirements. The dates of the site visits are as follows:
To arrange a time slot for a site visit at the Authority's testing sites, please contact James Davenport (NHSBT National Procurement Manager, Strategic Goods Team) using the inbuilt messaging facility of the eSourcing Portal by 12:00 (mid-day) 6.9.2016.
The Authority may only use assays that are listed on the Authority's Microbiology Kit Evaluation Group (KEG) or the Microbiology Test Evaluation Group (MTEG) for Scotland and Ireland ‘approved’ lists. As a result, tenderers must have KEG or MTEG approval for all assays forming part of its proposed system prior to the making of any contract award. Please see the tender documents for more detailed information and for instructions for submitting KEG approval applications.
The Authority intends to award the contract to the Tenderer whose tender is the most economically advantageous. The Authority will operate a staged evaluation of the technical and commercial elements of tender submissions. Tender submissions which ‘Pass’ all sections of the Technical Specification will then proceed to the Commercial, scored evaluation which only relates to cost (assessed on a ‘whole life cost’ basis). Tenderers should note that the Technical evaluation i.e. the evaluation of the response to the Technical Specification is not scored but carried out on a pass / fail basis. The Authority reserves the right to discontinue the procurement process at any time, which shall include the right not to award a contract, and does not bind itself to accept the lowest tender, or any tender received, and reserves the right to award the contract in part, or to call for new tenders should it consider this necessary. The Authority shall not be liable for any costs or expenses incurred by any candidate in connection with the completion and return of the information requested in this Contract Notice, or in the completion or submission of any tender, irrespective of the outcome of the competition or if the competition is cancelled or postponed. All dates, time periods and values specified in this notice are provisional and the Authority reserves the right to change these. The Authority is subject to the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA) and the Environmental Information Regulations 2004 (EIR) and may be required to disclose information received in the course of this procurement under FOIA or the EIR. In addition, in accordance with the UK Government's policies on transparency, the Authority intends to publish procurement documentation and the text of any resulting contractual arrangements, subject to possible redactions at the discretion of the Authority. Any redactions, whether in relation to information requests under FOIA, the EIR or policies on transparency will be in accordance with those grounds prescribed under FOIA and the EIR. Further information on transparency can be found at: https://www.government/publications/procurement-and-contracting-transparency-requirements-guidance

Eligibility requirements: Suppliers Instructions: How to Express Interest in this Tender: 1. Register your company on the eSourcing portal (this is only required once) — Browse to the eSourcing Portal: https://nhsbt.bravosolution.co.uk and click the link to register — Accept the terms and conditions and click ‘continue’ — Enter your correct business and user details — Note the username you chose and click ‘Save’ when complete — You will shortly receive an email with your unique password (please keep this secure); 2. Express an Interest in the Tender — Login to the portal with the username/password — Click the ‘PQQs / ITTs Open to All Suppliers’ link. (These are Pre-Qualification Questionnaires or Invitations to Tender open to any registered supplier) — Click on the relevant PQQ/ ITT to access the content — Click the ‘Express Interest’ button at the top of the page — This will move the PQQ /ITT into your ‘My PQQs/ My ITTs’ page. (This is a secure area reserved for your projects only) — You can now access any attachments by clicking ‘Buyer Attachments’ in the ‘PQQ/ ITT Details’ box; 3. Responding to the Tender — Click ‘My Response’ under ‘PQQ/ ITT Details’, you can choose to ‘Create Response’ or to ‘Decline to Respond’ (please give a reason if declining) — You can now use the ‘Messages’ function to communicate with the buyer and seek any clarification — Note the deadline for completion, then follow the on-screen instructions to complete the PQQ/ ITT — There may be a mixture of online and offline actions for you to perform (there is detailed online help available). You must then submit your reply using the ‘Submit Response’ button at the top of the page. If you require any further assistance please consult the online help, or contact the eTendering help desk.