REF Expenses system

{
  "id": "034518-2025",
  "tag": [
    "planning"
  ],
  "date": "2025-06-23T17:16:19+01:00",
  "ocid": "ocds-h6vhtk-05520f",
  "buyer": {
    "id": "GB-PPON-PMPN-7535-GNTG",
    "name": "UK Shared Business Services Ltd"
  },
  "tender": {
    "id": "DDaT24329",
    "lots": [
      {
        "id": "1",
        "status": "planning",
        "suitability": {
          "sme": true
        },
        "contractPeriod": {
          "endDate": "2030-03-20T23:59:59Z",
          "startDate": "2025-10-21T00:00:00+01:00"
        }
      }
    ],
    "items": [
      {
        "id": "1",
        "relatedLot": "1",
        "deliveryAddresses": [
          {
            "region": "UK",
            "country": "GB",
            "countryName": "United Kingdom"
          }
        ],
        "additionalClassifications": [
          {
            "id": "66000000",
            "scheme": "CPV",
            "description": "Financial and insurance services"
          },
          {
            "id": "72000000",
            "scheme": "CPV",
            "description": "IT services: consulting, software development, Internet and support"
          }
        ]
      }
    ],
    "title": "REF Expenses system",
    "value": {
      "amount": 150000,
      "currency": "GBP",
      "amountGross": 180000
    },
    "status": "planning",
    "legalBasis": {
      "id": "2023/54",
      "uri": "https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2023/54/contents",
      "scheme": "UKPGA"
    },
    "description": "The Research Excellence Framework (REF) is the exercise which runs approximately every 7 years to assess the quality of research across all UK universities.  The outcomes of the exercise is a quality profile for all assessed disciplines for participating universities.  This quality profile is used to calculate the distribution of approx. £2bn of research funding annually.  The exercise is run by Research England on behalf of all four UK funding bodies. \nAll submitted research is assessed by panels recruited by the REF project (approx. 1,200 panel members take part).  In addition to the assessment, a proportion of panel members are also heavily involved in the production of the policy which underpins the exercise. \nOver the course of the exercise recruited panel members are paid fees and are eligible to claim expenses for costs relating to their work.\nAn expense management platform is required for the above mentioned reason and must/should offer the below functionality:\nRequirements\n1.\tAn easy to use user experience of uploading receipts and creating expenses of the correct value based on the receipts.\n2.\tThe solution must offer a mobile app for users to enable quick claims to be made using smartphone camera apps to upload receipts\n3.\tThe solution must offer the OCR feature to enable claim lines to be autopopulated by data contained in the receipt\n4.\tThe solution must be WCAG 2.2 compliant for accessibility\n5.\tSupplier must hold Cyber Essentials+ and ISO127001 security certification\n6.\tMust provide secure, encrypted storage and self-service of users' bank details\n7.\tMust be able to store international bank details\n8.\tMust be able to handle claims/payments in different currencies\n9.\tMust provide SSO access with MS Entra\n10.\tMust provide the ability to store additional details against users (for example the REF panel they work on or the role they undertake)\n11.\tMust provide the ability for the claims to be managed in a single queue to be reviewed and approved by a team of expense claim administrators\n12.\tMust provide the ability to configure approval workflows\n13.\tThe expenses system must interface into the UKRI corporate accounting system, Oracle Fusion\na.\tThere will be the need to extract single claim total for each approved claim, including the claimant's bank details and cost code in order to be processed by Fusion\nb.\tThis must interface into Fusion via API or by exporting data in a format suitable compatible with the interface provided for Oracle's ADFDI template\n14.\tVarying levels of approval for expenses must be available, enabling the REF admin/budget holders to closely monitor and control the payments. (For example administrators are reviewing and approving individual claims but a 2nd stage approval might be sought for an overall payment run by a more senior colleague)\n15.\tThe system must have audit tracking to give visibility of the history of a claim (approved by, sent for payment etc).\n16.\tThe system must enable claim categories to be created and configured\n17.\tThe system must enable mileage claims and allow for configuration of the cost per mile \n18.\tThe system must be able to manage different claim types to be charged against different cost codes (for example one code for expenses and one for fee payments).\n19.\tThe system must offer configurable reports to be run (for example claim and payment summaries by FY/Quarter or summaries by user profiles)\n20.\tThe system should have a user interface that can be tailored (for example to have REF branding applied, hiding features that end users won't need access to to make the interface as simple as possible).\nUsage information\n\tThe REF programme will be recruiting 600 users in the first two years (2025-2027).  The usage patterns will vary throughout those years with claims clustered when meetings occur (dates for these are not yet set).  There will be 16 meetings during the first two years.  It is estimated that there will be no more that 300 claims in a single month.  \n\tThe claims will include T&S claim and claims for fees due to the panel members.\n\tIn 2028/2029 the panel membership will grow to 1,200 and the panels will attend up to 800 meetings both in-person, virtual and hybrid where expense claims will be incurred\n\tPreferred billing solution is a fixed annual/monthly charge for the period of the contract\nAt this stage we are conducting preliminary market engagement to gain further feedback from the market.\nBy responding you will be engaging in non-competitive dialogue which will enable UKRI to develop and assess the market's appetite, concerns, and views on formulation of its requirements. UKRI may consider the information and responses received as part of the preliminary market consultation to help inform the specification and further decision making in relation to the planning and conduct of the procurement, ensuring all valid options are considered.\nThis form is an expression of interest only; the full details of the project and the desired outcomes will be provided in the Tender Notice\nProcurement Plan / Dates and Budget\nProject budget - £150,000 excluding VAT \nIndicative advertising timescales - June 2025 - October 2025.\nIndicative Contract start date - October 2025\nContract end date - March 2030. \nValidation Questions\nInterested suppliers please respond to these questions. Send your response to Mobolaji.Dawodu@uksbs.co.uk\nTo ensure that this procurement maximises appropriate bidder responses we have the following questions that we would like to pose to interested suppliers:\n1. Procurement Capacity - Based on the indicative timescales for the procurement, please can you advise if your organisation would have capacity to provide a bid response within the timescales detailed?\n2. Project Interest - Based on the specification provided, please can you advise if your organisation are interested in supplying these services to the contracting authority?\n3. Further Information - Based on the specification provided, please advise if there is any further information you would require, or any specification questions you would need answered in order to put a bid response forward?\nBased on the project detail provided, is it your intention to respond to the Tender documentation once issued?\nYes / No\nName:\nEmail:\nOrganisation:",
    "communication": {
      "futureNoticeDate": "2025-07-02T23:59:59+01:00"
    },
    "aboveThreshold": true,
    "mainProcurementCategory": "services"
  },
  "parties": [
    {
      "id": "GB-PPON-PMPN-7535-GNTG",
      "name": "UK Shared Business Services Ltd",
      "roles": [
        "buyer"
      ],
      "address": {
        "region": "UKK14",
        "country": "GB",
        "locality": "Swindon",
        "postalCode": "SN2 1FF",
        "countryName": "United Kingdom",
        "streetAddress": "Polaris House, North Star Avenue"
      },
      "details": {
        "classifications": [
          {
            "id": "publicAuthorityCentralGovernment",
            "scheme": "UK_CA_TYPE",
            "description": "Public authority - central government"
          }
        ]
      },
      "identifier": {
        "id": "PMPN-7535-GNTG",
        "scheme": "GB-PPON"
      },
      "contactPoint": {
        "email": "policy@uksbs.co.uk"
      }
    }
  ],
  "language": "en",
  "planning": {
    "documents": [
      {
        "id": "034518-2025",
        "url": "https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Notice/034518-2025",
        "format": "text/html",
        "noticeType": "UK2",
        "description": "Preliminary market engagement notice on Find a Tender",
        "documentType": "marketEngagementNotice",
        "datePublished": "2025-06-23T17:16:19+01:00"
      }
    ],
    "milestones": [
      {
        "id": "engagement",
        "type": "engagement",
        "status": "scheduled",
        "dueDate": "2025-07-02T23:59:59+01:00",
        "description": "Expressions of Interest (EOI)\nProject Name: DDaT24329 - Workplace REF2029\nRoute to Market: Open Tender\nResponse required by: Wednesday 2nd July 2025\nResponse required to: Mobolaji.Dawodu@uksbs.co.uk"
      }
    ]
  },
  "initiationType": "tender"
}