(E)fficient procurement

Faced with government spending cuts, there is greater pressure on housing providers to deliver more with less. This agenda presents complex challenges for social housing procurement.

Significant tensions are emerging between cost reductive efficiency gains, the ability to achieve long-term best value and the need to deliver savings - at a time when social landlords are committed to the creation of genuinely sustainable communities.

Making cuts that result in poorer quality services and outcomes for tenants will fail to deliver value for money. Any change to services should result in a net improvement in outcomes for tenants. Ultimately, efficiency saving is not about cutting front-line services, but about driving efficiencies throughout the back office. Enabling better buying, reducing paper bureaucracy and greater collaboration all create savings.  Demand from Members for e-procurement solutions, as an effective mechanism to achieve savings and deliver the Government’s Operational Efficiency Programme, has seen a marked increase.

In response to untapped Member efficiency opportunities, PfH has launched a partnership with ProcServe, a leading provider of eCommerce solutions, to provide a pioneering eProcurement and Purchase-to-Pay solution for the social housing sector.  PfH’s Custom built eProcurement marketplace will help the social housing sector gain visibility, control and compliance over spending, enabling more strategic and cost-effective purchasing decisions and reducing processing costs.

The PfH eProcurement marketplace, available for all PfH Members from summer 2010, will make it easier for Members to:

•    Make, track and report efficiency savings

•    Access PfH Agreements

•    Monitor and control spending

•    Make more strategic and cost effective purchasing decisions

•    Trade electronically with suppliers

•    Streamline their procurement process

The solution provided by ProcServe, will help streamline and deliver effective procurement services for social housing providers across the UK. It will specifically help social housing organisations to reduce the price paid for goods and services by providing them with easy access to pre-loaded framework agreements, provide simple connectivity to suppliers and deliver e-invoicing capabilities. The solution will help these housing providers to streamline their procurement process, enable the accurate tracking of spend and deliver efficiency savings.

The Procurement for Housing eMarketplace will be available in 2010. For more information about the service, please contact PfH on t: 0845 864 5260, e: info@procurementforhousing.co.uk.