Contract for the Provision of a System to manage HR Queries and HR Cases

This is an Award Notice for the Provision of a System to manage HR Queries and HR Cases. This is a direct award because competition is absent for technical reasons.

The system will have the capability to manage both HR queries and HR cases and enable workflow between several HR teams to improve efficiency. In addition, the system will provide a self-service access to a platform to raise queries and replace the use of email. The self-service provision will be available to all Council department employees and approx. 18,300 School, Herts Living and Herts at Home employees.

The system will manage the following: HR Queries - HR Payroll - quick queries related to pay, leave and family leave (approx. 2,500 per month) - HR Advisory - more complex employee relations queries needing ongoing support (e.g., relating to ill health, disciplinary, grievance, performance, probation, flexible working, wellbeing), approx. 1000 per month. HR Cases Queries that have become cases as they need formal support through a specialist team, to manage through to a conclusion (e.g., ill health, disciplinary, grievance, probation, performance). These are escalated by the Service Desk (approx., 40 per month) with associated case notes and key documents. The system will be able to track these cases in detail including durations for both live, on-hold and closed cases.

The Council have procured a system to deliver the requirements of the HR Service Desk to support the Council in improving the manager and employee journey and deliver business needs including tracking and responding to call and queries efficiently even where hand offs to other teams are required.

Hertfordshire County Council (HCC) is relying on Regulation 32(2)(b)(ii) of the Public Contract Regulations 2015 in making this award without prior publication. Regulation 32(2)(b)(ii) permits such an award where competition is absent for technical reasons.

The Council's HR team currently uses a highly modified electronic query & case management system provided by Sunrise Software Ltd. The modified software has been developed and meets the specific needs of the Council to provide critical functionality in support of the traditional HR services provided to the Council, schools, fire services and Council trading entities. The Council has been unable to source similar functionality and personalisation of services from alternative software available on the market.

The Council has therefore awarded a contract to Sunrise Software Ltd. This represents a best value approach to ensure the ongoing service delivery of a critical software system to support the HR functionality.