Software package and information systems

Tender description

The University of Bath is seeking to appoint a vendor or vendors to supply an Activity Based Costing solution to provide: —Retrospective Course Costing (RCC), —Transparent Approach to Costing (TRAC) reporting, —Internal Resource Allocation Models (RAM), —Costing assumptions for Prospective Course Costing (PCC). The University of Bath is seeking to appoint a vendor or vendors to supply an Activity Based Costing solution to provide: Retrospective Course Costing (RCC) Should allow for the reporting of fully absorbed costs and income down to the given level. For the University of Bath, the level needs to be at least to course level in the first instance but where data is available down to the module level. Transparent Approach to Costing (TRAC) Is an annual activity based costing process. The principles of cost allocations apply for TRAC but there may be some specific differences in the approach for our internal cost reporting (RAM) and TRAC. We require a system that allows for different costing methods to be used. Resource Allocation Models (RAM) Looks at department level costing that shows the income and costs by source of income and type of costs. It is split into direct costs and central costs. The direct costs are reported from their cost centre in the ledger and the faculty costs and centrals costs are allocated based on cost drivers. Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) Is an annual return that reports the University's financial expenditure activity in a given financial period. Costs are categorised according to a pre-defined template and must reconcile with Note 9 of the University's annual published financial statements. The solution is required to map financial data to HESA cost centre to allow the solution output to reconcile back to HESA returns, but not actually produce the returns. Prospective Course Costing (PCC) Relies upon central cost assumptions to ensure all prospective courses are evaluated accurately in terms of financial viability. It is anticipated that the solution will be able to generate department level central cost assumptions that can be broken down into more granular detail for example looking at lab vs non-lab, undergraduate vs post graduate. The University's budget for the procurement of the Activity Based Costing Solution is 75 000 GBP — 175 000 GBP (Including Vat) should the contract run for its potential of 4 years plus up to 2 extended years.