back to article New £4bn UK.gov IT shopping centre slips launch deadline

Bosses have been told whether or not their businesses have provisionally made it onto a new list of approved IT suppliers for Blighty's public sector - and resellers feature heavily. The three-year IT Hardware and Services (ITH&S) framework offers £4bn in work and sales, and will - after delays - eventually replace ESPO …

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  1. Cucumber C Face
    Linux

    I have a cunning plan minister

    >All of the suppliers hoping to get onto the list have been through e-auctions, held by the government, to determine which ones are offering the best prices<

    And shall continue to offer the best prices once they are on this list for 3 , 2 , 1 , zero seconds. Too slow you missed it. Locked into the same old expensive suppliers yet again Sir Humphrey.

    You could not effing make it up!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      When will they learn that sheep led by morons and managed by idiots can ever be successful in the implementation of IT.

      The main sticking point are those that call themselves MP's employing their mates as advisors, whose only IT experience is playing a porn DVD.

      When will this finally stop, when will they learn?

      1. sam 16

        The cause of overspends usually seems to be Changes To Requirements after the inital, competitively tendered contract is signed.

        Try that with your builder - half way through building a home extention, you tell him it needs to be half the size because you can't afford it anymore, and have a toilet. He will look at the 3 foot high wall in your garden, and charge you a lot of money.

        You talk to people working on major, overspending contracts, and they will tell you every time that the customer insisted on changing something, and now it was going to cost a bomb.

  2. LarsG
    FAIL

    The more things change the more they stay the same

    Remember when there was a promise that small businesses would get a crack at Government contracts, they day it was announced by Cameron as he went into Downing Street?

    Never happened so as Snake Pliskin said..

    'THE MORE THINGS CHANGE THE MORE THEY STAY THE SAME'.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Wait and see...

    Actually the appeals could be interesting. The contract has already disqualified a number of well-known names for non-compliance on the initial submission. The original hardware requirements were precise to the point of obsession in some places, but tenderers were required to match the *exact* spec. A more efficient, better performing product with a lower number on the spec sheet would be disqualified, just to ensure that all the selected products were directly comparable.

    On the same basis, disqualification threatens successful vendors who attempt to hike their prices in the first 90 days or after that without documentary proof. It's not a guarantee that vendors won't stick prices through the roof, but it's better than a single supplier contract with "put up or shut up" pricing.

    Anon, because my employer hasn't been disqualified, but would be if we took issue with the inconsistencies in the awarding process.

    1. Cucumber C Face
      Coat

      Re: Wait and see...

      Your point about restrictions on jacking up prices on the exact spec within 90 days is well made.

      However natural disasters in the Far East aside [and suppliers have a get out clause for this], in IT and telecoms the "exact spec" is usually cheaper on the open market within 90 days. So these suppliers are granted license to shift obsolete gear for years at premium fixed prices and have any risk underwritten by the taxpayer.

      Trebles, 50 quid floppy discs and directorships all round.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hmmm...

    Not so many actual kit makers on the lists for the lots I'd have to buy from. Limits the field somewhat.

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