Apprenticeship Training Providers Dynamic Purchasing System

In April 2017 the way the government funds apprenticeships in England changed - employers with a pay bill over £3 million per annum are required to contribute to an apprenticeship levy. Since 1st May 2017, employers have been able to use their levy funds to cover the costs of apprenticeship training, assessment and certification. Public sector organisations, including the NHS, will need to comply with the Public Contract Regulations 2015 when selecting a provider/assessment organisation, as well as adhere to their own organisational Standing Financial Instructions.

Benefits of the contract

The Apprenticeship Training Providers Dynamic Purchasing System - open to all public sector bodies - was awarded on 3rd April 2017, and provides contracting authorities with a compliant and quick route to market to procure apprenticeship training provision. The DPS is not divided into lots but structured so that potential providers can select which of the training categories and regions they wish to be considered for, and to allow contracting authorities a choice of how best to approach the market.

The benefits for Contracting Authorities include:

• Shortened procurement time as advertisement in OJEU and PQQ stage has already been undertaken.

• The DPS encourages competition, as local providers can apply to join the DPS at any time during its period of validity.

• Participating organisations can develop their own specification, based on pre-developed templates, to meet their own requirements. 

• The very comprehensive specification for the DPS was created by NHS Education and Training leads.

• Award criteria can be formulated more precisely for specific local contracts.

• Award of individual tenders can be quicker than under some other procedures. The minimum time limit for return of tenders is 10 days.

• Training providers have to meet minimum criteria to be awarded a place on the DPS - this ensures that only providers of sufficiently high quality apprenticeship delivery are invited to take part in mini competitions.

• A full suite of mini competition templates is available to ease the competition process, and LPP will provide help and support in running mini competitions.

For full information on how the DPS works please refer to the User Guide (see right).

Contract description

The DPS is split into different categories of apprenticeships and into different regions. A map of the regional boundaries is attached in the Supporting Information box

The following apprenticeship categories are currently in scope of the DPS: 

Selecting providers from the DPS to invite to Mini Competition

Contracting authorities must use the online search tool, available from the myLPP homepage, in order to determine which providers on the DPS must be invited to the mini competition. This online tool replaces the previous excel-based regional lists. As the list of qualified suppliers for each category may regularly change you should use the search tool immediately prior to issuing each mini competition. Instructions for using the online tool are available in the Supporting Information box.

If you are a contracting authority, delivering services as an Employer Provider, you may use the DPS in order to run a mini competition to contract with an End Point Assessment Organisation. Please contact LPP for a list of End Point Assessment Organisations who have been awarded to the DPS. 

Suppliers

Suppliers apply by registering on www.lppsourcing.org in the first instance and then searching for the relevant opportunity: - DN240205 – Dynamic Purchasing System for the Procurement of Apprenticeship Training.

Once you have expressed interest then a link to the PQQ will appear in the My Activities box on your homepage which will take you to the online PQQ. We will evaluate all submitted bids within 10 working days.

If you have any technical problems with Due North or any issues with your Due North account, then please contact their helpdesk on 0330 005 0352.

In order to comply with Education and Skills Funding Agency guidelines, all prime contractors of apprenticeship training must be listed on the Education and SFA register (RoATP) as a main provider. Contracting authorities must undertake their own checks prior to awarding any contracts.