The requirement

Purchasing mobile voice and data services is often a routine purchase for many NHS trusts, regularly resulting in varied contract end dates. This can create a barrier to switching suppliers to gain better value, as potential savings may be reduced or lost due to early termination charges. 

At CCS, through our regular bulk buying opportunities, our aggregation team helps health customers by combining their mobile voice and data requirements with other organisations. This collective buying power helps CCS achieve competitive pricing and favourable terms from suppliers, which increases savings for our customers.

The contracts were delivered through further competitions run via Lot 6 of our Network Services 2 framework.

The solution

In the last 12 months, 14 NHS customers have taken part in our mobile voice and data aggregations, which are run 3 to 4 times per year. 

Before each aggregation, we engage with the public sector to gauge interest in upcoming opportunities. Based upon approximate volumes, we identify minimum indicative savings and ceiling prices. These are guaranteed minimum savings that customers can expect to receive.

Customers can then confirm their volume commitment, tariff requirements, any other customer-specific requirements by signing a Call-Off Order Form and Letter of Intent. This confirms the customers’ commitment to buy. 

From this point, CCS runs the aggregation, identifies the supplier who can offer the best quality and price for the requirements, and presents each customer with a standalone contract. The process from the customer confirming their requirements to award takes around 6 weeks.

The results

Through the last 4 mobile voice and data aggregations, 14 NHS customers saved £3.9M – an average saving of 70%. 

By bringing together health customers with similar needs, our aggregations mean organisations can harness bulk buying power to unlock greater savings. Customer requirements ranged from 14 to 7,000 connections, and the savings delivered were 23% above the benchmarked rate.

Of these customers, 2 had joined a previous aggregation, and despite the large savings achieved through their initial aggregation, were still able to save another 68%. 

Add power to your procurement with CSS

Taking part in an aggregation means many of the usual further competition procurement steps are handled by CCS, saving you precious time and resources. We will draft all documentation, build the specification and run the procurement. 

This is a fully managed service, provided and funded by CCS, and is a tried and tested approach that has delivered significant savings to the public sector. 

Our next Mobile Voice and Data Services aggregation (NFC142) is now open for expressions of interest from customers. You have until mid-January 2022 to submit your requirements, with a formal contract award set to take place in March 2022. 

• If you would like to take part, please complete our online form quoting ‘NFC142 mobile voice and data aggregation’ in the comment box and a member of our team will be in touch. 
• Learn more about Network Services 2 via the webpage.
• To find out more about aggregation, visit our website or watch our webinar