Unit 4 Business World Application Support and Consultancy

Tender description

Why the Work is Being Done Oxford City Council (OCC) have a requirement to supplement existing application support and development offered by it’s internal ICT service and improve the resilience in respect of the Unit 4 Business World application (UBW) and therefore seek a third-party provider to provide such a service. Skills relevant to the following areas, but not exclusive to, within the UBW application are required: GL, AR, AP, PO Processing, Bank Reconciliation, SO Processing, Document Archive, ARC, Reporting, Planner and Budgeting, Interfaces/Integrations and Experience Packs with provision for transfer of knowledge to OCC’s ICT staff to enable them to self-resolve issues. This requirement must include an Application consultancy service to assist with minor configurations leading from application support incidents or requests raised from other services within OCC. Approval for any consultative support would be approved by ICT and Financial Services Management. Consultancy support must be available remotely or onsite when specifically requested. Problem to Be Solved Bidders for this work need to demonstrate they have provided similar application support and consultancy to other organisations relating to the UBW application, to include: On-Boarding Service: To familiarise themselves with how the UBW application is used within Oxford City Council (OCC). To include discussions with key users and ICT staff. Service Management: Management of incidents and responses to include making recommendations to OCC for system improvements, Requests for Change (RFC) management in conjunction with OCC’s ICT and Financial services, Systems and Data Management practices used to identify any incidents generated by system alerts or data changes and improvement recommendations provided periodically and reviewed at regular monthly meetings. Service Operation: As outlined in “Why the work is being done” section. Off-Boarding Service: To ensure relevant documentation specific to OCC is handed over to OCC within an agreed timeframe (30 days) and to ensure logins for network access and online support portal are disabled. Ad-Hoc Consultancy Service: OCC may require ad-hoc work to be undertaken as and when necessary. The bidder should provide a day rate card as part of their submission. Who Are the Users As the council's internal ICT application support service, we need an easy to use and reliable platform for reporting incidents that application users may experience and have a mechanism for requesting changes to the configuration of the application, such as; creation and amendment of workflow, creation and amendment of reports (Excelerator and Browser), creation and amendment of Report Templates (ARC), assistance with applying application patches and full application upgrades, assistance with carrying out refresh of Databases, assistance with specifying system improvements and undertaking small development projects, user management, creation and amendments to interface files due to changes to a 3rd party application, general advice and guidance relating to best practice,all of which will need to fall inline with OCC's internal Change Control Management process. Early Market Engagement Work Already Done Existing Team The supplier will work with the Council's internal ICT Application Specialist team as well as users of the Business World application. Current Phase Not applicable Work Location Where there is a requirement for the supplier to work at Oxford City Council premises then this will be in Oxford. Working Arrangments The supplier must operate a Service Desk function available in core hours (9 am to 5.30 pm) excluding weekends and bank holidays, with option to extend for out of hours work required. Contact with the Service Desk must be via web portal, email and telephone. Web portal provision must include a single view of calls/requests. Support to be provided remotely with secure access to OCC’s network. OCC require monthly performance reports in relation to agreed SLAs and a clear escalation route in place for any issues reported to the supplier where there is not a time and/or satisfactory outcome. Security Clearance Conforms to BS7858:2019/ISO 27001/Cyber Essentials Certification Additional T&Cs Contract initially for 1 year, reviewed after 6-months for the following 6-months with option to extend to 2 years. We would expect the support provision to start on 1st April 2020 and end on 31st March 2021. Any on-boarding process will need to be carried out prior to support commencing once the contact has been awarded. The successful bidder will have an already established relationship with Unit 4. It is expected that the supplier will need to interface with Unit 4 in respect of issue causes/resolutions and to keep up to date with latest product developments/road maps. Skills & Experience Have experience in providing Application Support and Consultancy services in relation to the Unit 4 Business World application Have experience in Incident Investigation and Response management Have experience in Systems and Data management Have experience in Change Request management Have experience in providing both technical and non-technical user guides and Have experience in providing monthly performance reports in relation to agreed SLAs Have extraordinary customer service and relationship management experience Have an already established relationship with Unit 4 Nice to Haves Have experience in providing application support for local government No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 5 Proposal Criteria How the approach or solution meets user needs Approach and methodology Estimated timeframes for the work Value for money Team structure Support the council's aims of: Enable an inclusive economy, Deliver more affordable housing, Support thriving communities, Pursue a zero carbon Oxford Cultural Fit Criteria Can work with clients with low technical expertise Share knowledge and experience with other team member Take responsibility for their work Work as a team with members of Oxford City Council Have a no-blame culture and encourage people to learn from their mistakes Payment Approach Fixed price Assessment Method Case study Work history Reference Presentation Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 60% Cultural fit 10% Price 30% Questions from Suppliers No questions have been answered yet Budget range