Tender for Arboriculture Services

Southend-on-Sea City Council (the Council) are seeking tender responses as part of a competitive procurement process to appoint a qualified Contractor in the re-tendering of the Council's Arboriculture Services Contract.

Southend-on-Sea is well known for its parks and gardens. Trees are important to the City's residents whether the trees are growing in parks or in streets. Maintenance of the street scene in general is a key corporate priority for the Council. The related contract, and the appointed Contractor, will play an important part in ensuring the successful delivery of this key priority, by undertaking arboricultural services on the Council's behalf. For this reason, it is imperative all tree work undertaken by the appointed Contractor is carried out by experienced and skilled staff to the standards specified in the Tender Documents.

For the avoidance of doubt, all perspective tenderers are advised that there is an incumbent Contractor, and it is believed that TUPE will apply. One of the minimum requirements of the procurement process is requesting the TUPE information from the Council. The full details of how to do this are provided in the Tender Documents.

The Tender Documents can be accessed via:

https://procurement.southend.gov.uk/southend/portal.nsf/index.htm

The deadline for receipt of clarification requests relating to the Tender Documents: 14:00 Friday 27th October 2023

The deadline for submission of Tender Responses is: 14:00 Tuesday 14th November 2023

The Minimum Level Requirements of the procurement process are covered in detail in the Tender Documents provided. This includes, but is not limited to, detail on TUPE Requirements, a Tenderer's ability, Financial Standing, Insurance and mandatory service requirements.

Mandatory service requirements include, but are not limited to, Permits and Licences required for working on the Highway, the contract's timeframes and response times, as well as the confirmed standards for the related tree work.

In regard to the evaluation the elements which are "scored" or "pass / fail" are fully explained within the documentation provided as part of the procurement process.

The proposed Contract start date and the Contract end date (as of the time of writing and confirmed above) relate to the initial contract period. This does not include the possible extension period. The proposed duration of the initial contract period is 5 years 2 months, with a possible extension of a further 2 years (or any part thereof).

The current annual budget is in the region of £379,000. However, this level of spend is not guaranteed and is subject to change, and may decrease over the duration of the contract. This is covered further in the Tender Documents.

Additional information: The Tender Documents can be accessed via:

https://procurement.southend.gov.uk/southend/portal.nsf/index.htm