Financial auditing services

Tender description

The Welsh Government is seeking to appoint a contractor to provide an audit service for its Public Sector Broadband Aggregation Network (PSBA). An audit service is needed to provide financial assurance to the Welsh Government and other potential stakeholders that the costs and charges being levied by the supplier are appropriate and consistent with the contractual terms set out in the PSBA agreement. The Public Sector Broadband Aggregation Network is a Wales wide managed network which connects public sector organisations in Wales to a private secure information and communications technology wide area network. PSBA was originally devised in 2006 to achieve public sector savings on wide area network services by leveraging aggregated demand for these services and therefore aggregating buying power in the market. During the lifetime of the project PSBA has connected almost every public sector organisation across Wales and now supports over 4 500 public connectivity sites. An audit exercise is needed to provide financial assurance to the Welsh Government and other potential stakeholders that the costs and charges being levied by the supplier are appropriate and consistent with the contractual terms set out in the PSBA agreement. The following are the key requirements that the Welsh Government requires from the audit function: — to verify the accuracy of charges and the costs of all suppliers of the services to the PSBA contract, — to review any books of account kept by the supplier to the extent that they relate to the provision of the services, — to carry out an audit and certification of the suppliers accounts in relation to the contract, — to review the suppliers compliance with its contractual obligations relating to value for money provisions, — to review the accuracy and completeness of reports, — to verify the accuracy and completeness of any management information delivered, — to review the integrity, confidentiality and security of the Authority’s Data, — to review the suppliers compliance with the Data Protection Act 1998, the Freedom of Information Act 2000 in accordance with Clauses 45.2 (Protection of Personal Data) and any other legislation applicable to the services, — to review the suppliers compliance with its obligations under services, performance of services and quality assurance and performance monitoring.