FOI – 2023-000054 - Dynamic purchasing system suppliers (HTML)

Date received - 08 February 2023 | Date responded -  02 March 2023

Request

Please accept this email as a request for the names of the 17 suppliers who are on both DPS contracts.

I fail to see what the commercial confidentiality argument here is as there is no deal in place, and indeed when the deals are in place with suppliers it is the intention to make the names of the suppliers public.

Essentially, it is a list of firms which have been accepted as being able to tender for public sector work but have no guarantee of that work unless it is agreed with a health board (happy to be corrected on this if I've got the wrong end of the stick).

What is in the public interest is where £300m of public money could be spent and detail of the types of private healthcare firms which have been accepted on to the list given the varied backgrounds and ownership structures of these firms.

Response

I can advise you that we have now completed the search of our records and can provide you with the following information:

Please find below the list of suppliers approved via the Dynamic Purchasing System (DPS) contracts:

NP64821 Private Healthcare Outsourcing DPS

• La Belle Forme
• ROC Health Services
• The Aberdeen Clinic
• Spire Healthcare Limited
• Elanic Ltd
• Optical Express

NP67622 Medical Insourcing Services DPS

• Abicare Health Solution
• Healthcare Business Solutions
• Synaptik
• Portland Clinical
• Remedy Healthcare
• Medacs Healthcare
• 18 week Support
• Insource Medicare Limited
• Medinet Clinical Services
• The Aberdeen Clinic
• Sirona Medical

Under Section 15 of the Freedom of Information Scotland Act, 2002 NHS National Services Scotland (NSS) strives to be as transparent and helpful as possible. The NSS Communication teams’ judgement in response to your initial enquiry was that while individual suppliers had all been made aware that they have been successful, they would not have known which other companies (including potential commercial rivals) had also been successful.

NSS recognise and support the substantial public interest in such matters. We would reiterate that all contract awards in relation to the DPS contracts will be made publicly available via the Public Contracts Scotland website.

I trust you will find the information of assistance and if you require any further information, please do not hesitate to contact us.

If you are unhappy with any aspect of how we have dealt with your request, you can make representations to us asking us to review the handling of your request.

If you require any further information, please contact Head of Information and Cyber Security, Digital and Security within 40 working days of the date of this correspondence.

Contact

Address

If after a review you are still unhappy, you also have the right to apply to the Scottish Information Commissioner, who can be contacted at Kinburn Castle, St Andrews, Fife, KY16 9DS, or via their application form.

National Services Scotland (NSS) is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. You can view all FOI responses within our FOI Publications repository.