Procurement details: DHSC: Adult Social Care - Capacity Tracker System Users - User Research

• Term or acronym:

  PQP

• Definition:

  Price per quality point (PQP) is an evaluation technique designed to fairly compare bids of varying quality and price. PQP is calculated for each bid by - determining the quality score for each bid, expressed as a whole number rather than as a percentage - dividing the bid price by the quality score to give an output price per quality point. We will be using PQP to evaluate submissions at Stage 2 rather than the 50%/20%/10%/20% split that the DOS forms force us to select. More information will be supplied at next stage but the quality aspect will be split 60% Technical, 30% Cultural Fit, 10% Social Value.

• Summary of work:

  DHSC require digital expertise to undertake an extensive piece of discovery work to understand Adult Social Care care home and care home provider users in greater detail, including Local Authority users, data quality practice and current digital application interaction.

• Where the supplied staff will work:

  No specific location (for example they can work remotely)

• Why the work is being done:

  Prior to the pandemic most Adult Social Care (ASC) data was collected annually, with significant time lags and varying quality standards impacting consistency of the data collected. There were several acknowledged data gaps, particularly regarding data on care users in privately funded care and on quality of care. Data on ASC comes from a number of different sources, including from Local Authorities, directly from care providers, and from care users via care surveys, with no standardisation in how this data is collated, shared and used. During the pandemic we have established near real-time data collection from ASC providers, which has demonstrated the benefits of timely data to target support and respond to emerging issues. Currently, DHSC has a ‘one data set fits all’ approach with Capacity Tracker, which unrealistically assumes that one data set will apply to every provider. By better understanding how different groups of people use and interact with Capacity Tracker, we would be able to improve services for those who use it. The ability to tailor future systems to different characteristics of users would reduce the burden on them and free up their time to provide high-quality care, as their specific needs are being realised and catered for to a greater extent. Observing how users interpret data items would also support improvements to data quality.

• The business problem:

  This work is being commissioned because we do not currently have any directly employed staff that meet the requirement, skills and experience of the user researcher or service designer roles in order to produce robust recommendations. An external user research specialist would have the expertise and skills to carry out high quality user research and draw the appropriate conclusions from this. Without the necessary expertise, we may rely too heavily on assumptions or confirmation bias in attempting to guess what providers want and these may lead to inaccurate conclusions being drawn.

• User type:

  As a care provider,

• Definition:

  I need to be able to gather and submit relevant data once, in the least burdensome way possible, so I can prioritise delivery of care and reduce the time spent submitting data. I need to see the data I have submitted and assess my performance against other providers in my area and be able to use the data to plan ahead.

• User type:

  As DHSC,

• Definition:

  I need to gather data in order to have a clear and single view of the situation in the care sector, from a care provider's perspective, for monitoring and assurance purposes. I need a single source of good quality, timely and standardised data to produce evidence to make informed policy decision, monitoring and assurance.

• User type:

  As a local authority, ICS or NHS Trust,

• Definition:

  I need to be able to receive timely and accurate information from providers about their capacity and occupancy levels in order to allocate care services to care users, but also performance data to improve quality of care. I need data from one single source to have coherent information and improve collaboration between stakeholders in my area.

• Any pre-market engagement done:

  No early market engagement has been carried out.

• Work done so far:

  DHSC has already done some engagement with the ASC sector in order to understand different actors' needs in terms of provider level data, understand how data is currently shared/collected and to get an idea of provider's preferences. NHSE, who are leading work on digital social care records, have also engaged with care provider software suppliers and are developing a adult social care data standard which will eventually influence the development of the new provider level data collection. We can look to share, in confidence, summary reports of the various engagement pieces done so far with shortlisted suppliers

• Which phase the project is in:

  Not applicable

• Existing team:

  The existing team consists of 2 Statisticians, 1 analyst and 1 Section Head, The supplier would also expect to work with North England Commissioning Support Unit (NECSU), who built and develop the application. They would need to work with NECSU Regional Leads to source participants and would also likely need to present findings to a "Provider Data Assurance Group", comprising of data users and stakeholders, such as provider representative groups, local Government and other Central Government Departments.

• Address where the work will be done:

  Remote In-person meetings (location TBA) Restrictions around Data Access would require UK operation

• Working arrangements:

  The supplier will be expected to attend fortnightly meetings, remotely, with the DHSC to update on their progress. The supplier will be asked to attend in-person meetings, where possible, towards the beginning, middle and end of the contract (location TBA) The supplier will be asked to attend a final meeting, to present the final findings.

• Security and vetting requirements:

  Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS)

• Latest start date:

  16 December 2024

• Contract length:

  0 years 3 months 0 days

• Optional extension:

  0 years 1 months 15 days

• special term or condition:

  All expenses must be pre-agreed between the parties and must comply with the Department of Health and Social Care's Travel and Subsistence (T&S) Policy. Expenses will not be payable by DHSC where the resource is home based or where working at primary work locations stated in the SoW (London DHSC office 39 Victoria Street SW1H 0EU, or Quarry House, Leeds LS2 7PD)

• special term or condition:

  All vendors are obliged to provide sufficient guarantees to implement appropriate technical and organisational measures so that the processing meets the requirements of GDPR and ensures the protection of the rights of data subjects. For further information please see the Information Commissioner's Office website https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/data-protection-reform/overview-of-the-gdpr/

• Indicative maximum:

  £100000

• Indicative minimum:

  The contract value is not specified by the buyer

• Further information:

  Up to £100,000 budget for the initial 3 month term

• Contracted out service or supply of resource?:

  Contracted out service: the off-payroll rules do not apply

• How many suppliers to evaluate:

  5

• Technical Competence:

  50%

• Cultural fit:

  20%

• Social values:

  10%

• Price:

  20%

• Essential skills and experience:

  8%

• Nice-to-have skills and experience:

  4%

• Technical questions:

  88%

• Description:

  Have a proven and evidenced track record of delivering successful user research and service design projects for digital solutions to time

• Weighting:

  25%

• Description:

  User research and service design experience

• Weighting:

  25%

• Description:

  Creating a variety of tailored and useable user research outputs and artefacts, such as scenario testing, persona creation, system and empathy mapping

• Weighting:

  25%

• Description:

  Experience in and capacity to perform in-depth engagement with a wide range of diverse stakeholders with competing priorities and needs

• Weighting:

  25%

• Description:

  Ability to communicate and share findings and produce digestible reports, complex findings and persona's, notably for those without UR and Service Design knowledge

• Weighting:

  25%

• Description:

  Existing knowledge of the regulated Adult Social Care sector

• Weighting:

  25%

• Description:

  Proven ability to engage with sometimes reluctant and / or time poor users to get effective insight

• Weighting:

  25%

• Description:

  Experience of delivering user research and service design projects for a public sector body

• Weighting:

  25%

• Question:

  Your team's approach and the methodology you will use to deliver detailed insights into the characteristics and interactions of different user groups, and ways in which the application could be tailored to better suit these needs and improve engagement This should include an example of your work history on a particular project in relatable areas of work, e.g., service design, engagement with users

• Weighting:

  34%

• Question:

  Your team's proposed make up covering relevant skills and experience to deliver the project, in particular how these skillsets will help you deliver this user research project

• Weighting:

  33%

• Question:

  An example of how you have previously identified risks and dependencies in a similar project, and the approaches you offered to manage them

• Weighting:

  33%

• Question:

  Demonstrate experience of proactively engaging with stakeholders to progress a project and communicating in an appropriate manner for the audience

• Weighting:

  34%

• Question:

  Demonstrate transparency and honesty when sharing findings, especially when sharing findings from stakeholder engagement exercises

• Weighting:

  33%

• Question:

  Working collaboratively with teams to facilitate knowledge transfer

• Weighting:

  33%

• Question:

  Demonstrate action to support health and wellbeing, including physical and mental health, in the contract workforce 1. Actions to invest in the physical and mental health and wellbeing of the contract workforce. Illustrative examples: - implementing the 6 standards in the Mental Health at Work commitment and, where appropriate, the mental health enhanced standards for companies with more than 500 employees in Thriving at Work with respect to the contract workforce, not just ‘following the recommendations’. - public reporting by the tenderer and its supply chain on the health and wellbeing of staff comprising the contract workforce, following the recommendations in the Voluntary Reporting Framework. - engagement plans to engage the contract workforce in deciding the most important issues to address. 2. Methods to measure staff engagement over time and adapt to any changes in the results.

• Weighting:

  50%

• Question:

  Influence staff, suppliers, customers and communities through the delivery of the contract to support strong, integrated communities Activities that demonstrate and describe the tenderer's existing or planned measures to raise awareness or increase the influence of staff, suppliers, communities and/or any other appropriate stakeholders to promote strong, integrated communities through its performance of the contract, e.g. through engagement; co-design/creation; training and education; partnering/collaborating; and volunteering

• Weighting:

  50%

• Pricing model:

  Capped time and materials

• Additional assessment methods:

  Work history

• Question and answer session details:

  Questions should be submitted via the portal, A Clarification Log will be shared regularly

• Level:

  Fail

• Score:

  0

• Description:

  Failure to understand and/or failure to substantial failure to provide and/or provides no confidence that the requirement will be delivered.

• Level:

  Poor

• Score:

  1

• Description:

  The response meets elements of the requirement but gives concern in a number of significant areas. There are reservations because the response shows: • Some misunderstandings of the requirements; • Generally, a low level of information and detail provided; • The Tenderer fails to meet the requirement in many ways and/or materially in one or more ways; • Provides insufficient confidence that the Tenderer’s proposal will meet and deliver the requirements;

• Level:

  Satisfactory

• Score:

  2

• Description:

  The response broadly meets what is expected for the criteria. There are some areas of concern. The response therefore shows: • The Tenderer, generally, understands and addresses issues appropriately; • Some areas of misunderstanding of the requirements; • A generally low level of information and detail provided; • More of a “model answer” than a true commitment; • The response only provides some confidence that the Tenderer’s proposal will deliver requirements;

• Level:

  Good

• Score:

  3

• Description:

  The response clearly meets the required standard in all material respects. There are no significant areas of concern. The response therefore shows: • A good understanding of the issues; • A good level of detail; • Demonstrable evidence that the proposals are achievable; • The response therefore provides a good level of confidence the Tenderer’s proposal will deliver the requirements;

• Level:

  Excellent

• Score:

  4

• Description:

  The response clearly exceeds many aspects of the criteria. There are no significant areas of concern. The response therefore shows: • A very good understanding of the requirements; • Clear, detailed proposals of how and what will be delivered; and • The response therefore provides a high degree of confidence that the Tenderer’s proposal will meet the requirements.

• Publication of stage 1:

  04/10/2024

• Clarification period closes:

  14/10/2024 15:00

• Deadline for suppliers to submit their stage 1 responses:

  21/10/2024 11:00

Return to DHSC: Adult Social Care - Capacity Tracker System Users - User Research

Help

You can contact us by email, phone or using the enquiry form .

Email:

info@crowncommercial.gov.uk

Telephone:

0345 410 2222

CCS customer services team is available Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm.