Public procurement notice: Voluntary Ex Ante Transparency Notice
Published: 2021-03-19
Buyer: West Essex Clinical Commissioning Group
Country: UK
Contract type: Services
Procedure: Contract award without prior publication
CPV classification: 34114122 | 85100000: Health services
Estimated value: 4000000 GBP
Award criteria: The most economic tender

Technical requirements: This is a voluntary ex-ante transparency notice and is intended to provide notice of the contracting authority's intention to award a 12-month contract (with the option to extend for a further 12 months) for the provision of non-emergency patient transport services to its incumbent provider East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust (EEAST).
This voluntary ex-ante transparency notice follows previous notices placed in OJEU relating to the extension of the contract for these services (VEAT 2020/S 048-114897 published on 9 March 2020 and contract award notice (2020/S 096-230726 published 18 May 2020).
The Non-Emergency Patient Transport Service (NEPTS) takes patients to and from their homes, to their care provider, for planned appointments and treatment. Access to NEPTS is restricted by eligibility criteria, but at a high level are for those patients who:
The current NEPTS contract in West Essex is due to expire on 31 March 2022. The contracting authority has plans to procure the service in collaboration with the Hertfordshire Clinical Commissioning Groups to create an Integrated Care System (ICS) wide service. A project team was established to progress this procurement process, through discussions it has been identified that it is likely that the service models will change in line with other transformation programmes being implemented, on which the success of this project is dependent on the outcomes. This will ensure that urgent and emergency journeys are fully considered to ensure gaps in current service provision are considered and commissioned appropriately. This requires significant commissioning and operational work with the Acute and Community providers at a time when operational capacity is dedicated to managing and recovering from the pandemic.
It is proposed that a new 1-year contract is awarded covering the period 1 April 2022 to 31 March 2023, with the option to extend for a further year (to 31 March 2024), which is the subject of this VEAT Notice. The value of the contract set out within this VEAT is the estimated value for the potential 2-year period. The value of the 1-year contract is c. GBP 2 million.
The proposed contract includes the option to extend for a further year from 1 April 2023-31 March 2024.
Following publication of this notice, West Essex CCG will allow a 10-day standstill period prior to entering into the contract.
Through discussions in progressing the procurement it has been identified that it is highly likely that the required service model for the NEPTS service will change when the outpatient modernisation programme is fully implemented and transport needs from this contract through urgent journeys to emergency journeys need to be fully considered to ensure current gaps in service provision are considered and commissioned appropriately. This will require significant commissioning and operational work with both Acute and Community providers at a time when operational capacity is dedicated to managing and recovering from the pandemic.
Therefore, it is likely that if the service is procured now the service will not achieve the outcomes required for the Hertfordshire and West Essex system as this work is dependent on the outputs from other transformational programmes currently ongoing across the ICS.
An extension to the contract will allow the transformational work to be completed to feed into the design of the new NEPTS service, ensuring that it is fit for purpose and can meet the needs of patients into the future.


Winner: East of England Ambulance NHS Trust
Award value: 4000000