Swindon Core Library Service - Extended Opening

Swindon Core Library Service – Extended Opening Soft Market Testing

Swindon Borough Council is seeking input from the market to enable the core library service run by Swindon borough Council to be able to extend the opening hours of the libraries beyond their staffed hours. This market assessment is not part of the procurement process, but is purely investigative in nature, to potentially assist the Council in defining a specification and contract for the design, supply, install and maintenance of the solution.

In preparation for this, it is our intention to hold some ‘Soft Market Testing’ on what is currently possible from suppliers within the market to refine the requirements for Swindon.
The same information will be gathered from all providers, who wish to participate in the Soft Market testing to assist the Council.

This advert relates to a proposed ‘soft market testing’ exercise only and is NOT a call for competition.

Any contracts for services or supplies relating to this exercise may be subject to separate procurement process(es) in accordance with the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 (as amended).
All participants in this ‘soft market testing’ exercise shall be responsible for their own costs (including third party costs) and the Contracting Authority shall have no liability to any participant.

Description

Swindon Borough Council are looking to extend library opening hours on top of staffed hours to allow library users to access library buildings and therefore library services. This would be a use of new technology to Swindon’s Library Service and therefore the Authority are exploring the market for options that could be put in place and any barriers for companies bidding for this opportunity.
At present Swindon Borough Council is in a public consultation period on changes to its core library service. The implementation of this technology would only be at the Swindon Borough Council core library service.

The purpose of this Soft Market Test is to gain intelligence on the supply market for Swindon Borough Council’s requirements, including information that will help define the most appropriate structure, plan and budget for any potential competitive procurement exercise.
Further details relating to the outline specification are provided in the attachments section on the South West Portal in the document Soft Market Testing Specification – SBC Core Service Extended Opening

Process details

Participants are invited to respond to the attached soft market testing response document in writing, along with providing details of their organisation.

Soft Market Testing Responses are required to be submitted no later than 9th September 2016, 14.00GMT by e-mail/ hardcopy to Jim Catton only.

For the avoidance of doubt, no information provided in response to this questionnaire will be used by the Council in assessing providers during any future procurement process, scheduled to commence in 2016.

If you require any clarifications on the soft market testing documents please submit these in writing via e-mail, including the project name clearly in the e-mail title, to Vanessa Parker at vparker@swindon.gov.uk by 2nd September2016, 12.00 GMT.

The Council’s responses to these clarification questions will be uploaded as attachments on the project webpage attachments section. Therefore it is the Supplier’s responsibility to check the site regularly for updates to clarifications, as you will not be advised when updates have been made.

In the event of difficulties downloading soft market testing documents, please refer to the named contacts Vanessa Parker at Vparker@swindon.gov.uk.

Please note that this project has been advertised on Contracts Finder/ other web portals, however, Supplying the South West Portal is the only portal that includes all the relevant documents required to respond to this soft market testing exercise.

We would encourage you to click on the ‘Register interest’ button to help the Council monitor the level of interest in this opportunity.

No Soft Market Testing responses will be considered without completing the Soft Market Testing documents in full including attachments and returning them in alignment with the instructions within the documents.

Following this soft market testing exercise it is our intention to complete a competitive procurement exercise for this contract.