Scottish public services website faces rebuild

The Scottish Government is seeking a supplier to rebuild and host its website for advertising public service contract opportunities.

A tender published by government last week said that it was looking for a supplier to take on the contract for Public Contracts Scotland for a period of up to 10 years.

The deal is expected to be worth between £1.6million and £3.2m.

“The portal which is currently in place is used approximately 160,000 times per month and users access over 1.1m pages of information each month," says a tender for the work released by the Scottish Government.

"It has been used to create over 96,000 contracts and associated awards since its inception in 2008.

“The service has continued to expand year on year; there are currently 67,000 user registrations. The service provider will be required to manage the migration of data from the current system.”

The portal will manage the procurement process for low value procurements and record contract award information and data.

It will be open to Scottish Government, local authorities, NHS Scotland, higher & further education bodies, police & fire authorities and third sector organisations to advertise contract opportunities.

The successful operator will be required to provide a fully managed and hosted service for the portal, including user support through a helpdesk.

They will be required to deliver future service enhancements to respond to customer needs developments in technology and changes in EU and other procurement legislation.

The contract duration will be for an initial five years with the option to extend for up to another five years, according to the tender.