OPPORTUNITY NOTICE - ONLINE COUNSELLING SERVICES FOR 11 - 18 YEAR OLDS IN NHS LEICESTER, LEICESTERSHIRE & RUTLAND CLINICAL COMMISSIONING GROUPs (CCG

This is a call for competition. The 3 Leicestershire CCG's will be re-commissioning their Online Counselling Services for 11 - 18-year-olds. The Commissioners are planning to procure a Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland (LLR) wide Online Counselling service from June 2021.

The Commissioners wish to receive responses to the Invitation to Tender (ITT) from suitably qualified and experienced Providers with the necessary capacity and capability (or a demonstrable ability to provide the necessary capacity and capability) to provide the range of services required.

The online counselling service will provide children and young people (C&YP) from the ages 11-18 years old resident and registered with a GP in Leicestershire County, Leicester City and Rutland who are experiencing emotional and or mental wellbeing/ mental health issues with direct access to friendly safe information, support and advice, including:

The Contract shall be for a term of three (3) years from the Service start date with the possibility of extending the term by up to another 24 months beyond the initial contracted term at Commissioners' request. The contract start date will be the 1st of June 2021.

The funding for the service will be a block contract with a value of £140k per annum, for a whole total contract value of up to £700k if the extension option is exercised in full after the initial three (3) years. The Commissioners will reserve the right not to consider Bids that are either above the affordability threshold (which is £140k per annum or £700k for the whole length of the contract if extensions used) or unusually low.

It is proposed that the terms and conditions of all the services, will reflect those contained in the NHS England Standard NHS Contract.

The invitation to tender (ITT) will be available from 20th January 2021 on M&L CSU Bravo portal (see below) and it will have a deadline for submissions 15th February 2021. Clarifications may be asked during the procurement process up to a week before the ITT deadline.

Interested providers are guided to the MLCSU eProcurement portal Bravo at https://mlcsu.bravosolution.co.uk to register their interest and gain access to this procurement's documents and more specific information.

Additional information: To register on the Bravo portal

1. If your organisation has registered previously, you do not need to re-register.

Register on the portal webpage at https://mlcsu.bravosolution.co.uk (registration and use of the website is free of charge).

For technical support in submitting your Expression of Interest or registering on the 'Bravo Solution' Electronic Sourcing system please contact the Bravo Solution helpdesk via Tel: 0800 069 8630 or email: help@bravosolution.co.uk

The online counselling service will provide children and young people (C&YP) from the ages 11-18 years old resident and registered with a GP in Leicestershire County, Leicester City and Rutland who are experiencing emotional and or mental wellbeing/ mental health issues with direct access to friendly safe information, support and advice, including:

• access to web chat,
• one to one chat sessions,
• email correspondence,
• Easy to use website for information and articles,
• An online one-to-one counselling service which is delivered via instant messaging,
• live chat session with trained counsellors according to each client's needs in an age-appropriate way,
• a secondary intervention of signposting to other local and national agencies for ongoing support, advice and information to address client's needs.

The objectives and expected outcomes are:

• Experience of delivering online counselling and flowing data to the Mental Health Services Dataset (MHSDS),
• Deliver an accessible service to the diverse communities of Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland, particularly targeting under-represented groups,
• Supporting integration of online counselling provision within mental health services at a neighbourhood and place-based level.

"Light Touch Regime" services

This procurement is for clinical services which are Light Touch Regime services for the purpose of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 as specified in Schedule 3 of the Regulations ("Regulations"). Accordingly, the contracting authorities are only bound by those parts of the Regulations detailed in Chapter 3 Particular Procurement Regimes Section 7. The contracting authorities are not voluntarily following any other part of the Regulations.

The procedure which the contracting authorities are following is set out in the tender. As the CCG is a relevant body for the purpose of the National Health Service (Procurement, Patient Choice and Competition) (No 2) Regulations 2013 these Regulations also apply to this procurement.