Cost Savings for Schools

Welcome to Public Procurement (Cost Savings) for Educate Together schools. The National Procurement Service uses information provided by participating groups of the public service community (including schools, local authorities etc) to bargain with service providers/ suppliers for a better rate for all involved. The Department of Public Expenditure Circular 006/2012 informs public bodies (including schools) of the mandatory requirement to utilise central (National Procurement Service) contracts.  The circular identifies the categories that are initially to be subject to the mandate.   

Schools can avail of savings in the following areas: 

ICT Consumables // Paper // Office Supplies and Stationery // Electricity // Gas

ICT Consumables

Schools are now REQUIRED to purchase ICT Consumables (e.g. toner for your printer, ink cartridges for your printer, cables, keyboards, CD- R/RW and DVD- R/RW) from the successful seller- Datapac. 

To get set up you need to:

1. Contact Datapac on Tel: 01 415 6000, Email: nps@datapac.com  Ask for Joanne McKeon or Orla Murphy as they are both looking after schools. 
2. Request the ICT consumables catalogue and ask them to set you up on their systems (for ordering/invoicing)
3. Once you receive you catalogue (it is available online/by email/ paper copy) you can start ordering!

Paper

As of 1 November 2012 it is mandatory for ALL schools to purchase photo-copying and multi-purpose paper from the sucessful seller- Office Depot.  Prices are fixed until 31 July 2013.  Discounts are available for online ordering and for payment by Electronic Fund Transfer (EFT).  

To get set up with Office Depot you need to:

1. Email:  NPSwelcome@officedepot.com and ask to set up your account.  Your email should contain the Contact person for the account, School Phone number and the Full address of the school (for billing purposes).  If you have any queries with your account/ order you can call Office Depot directly on 01- 8150781.

2. The Office Depot team will respond to your email with your account number and details of how you can place an order.   Schools will be able  to order by email, by fax, by phone or online. 

Office Supplies and Stationery

This contract will be mandatory in April 2013.  The existing catalogue needs to be updated to reflect the needs of primary schools.   It is very important that NPS get some feedback from the primary school sector as the current catalogue has only been used in other public sector bodies and second level schools to date.  If you would be interested in helping with this feedback please contact louise.daly@eduatetogether.ie (it wouldn’t take long- even a quick look at the catalogue would help!)

Electricity

Last year (2011/2012) the national office co-ordinated the involvement of Educate Together schools in a National Procurement Service competition for electricity supply. This competition ended at the end of the last school year and 1155 schools across the education sector took part (Schools signed up via Educate Together, CPSMA, IPPN, JMB and ACCS).  Savings ranging from 3% to 40% were achieved for schools.  Twenty-one Educate Together schools took part in total. We hope that more schools will take part in future as there are guaranteed savings for those involved.  

The successful suppliers that emerged from the competition were Electric Ireland and Energia.  Boards of Management of the schools who took part in last years competition received their new contracts for these suppliers over the Summer and returned to the NPS.  The deadline for signing up for this competition/returning contracts has now passed.  NPS are contacting schools who failed to return contracts within the deadline.  If you did not receive/return your contract in time- you can sign up for procurement next year.  

Schools that have not yet registered may now sign up to be included in a future Electricity competition run by National Procurement Service.   We recommend that you register your interest as soon as possible.

Sign up for new Electricity Competition

You may be wondering how such substantial savings were achieved in the last competition? Here are some of the criteria which influenced the cost savings: 

• Overcharging - contract rates not being charged.
• Supply points being on an inappropriate tariff.
• Supply points having incorrect Maximum Import Capacity (MIC)
• Application of low power factor surcharges (LPFSC)
• Application of “Procurement Competition’ deductions
• Review of incorrect metre readings

Gas

This competition is now closed (since October 18th). Participating schools have received an email from NPS alerting them that they will be receiving their new contracts in November 2012.   Once your school receives the new contract (by email) you should ensure that it is printed out and signed by the appropriate person immediately and returned to NPS.  Failure to do this within the timeframe will mean that your school will miss out on the savings of this competition.  

Schools who didn't take part and would like to sign up to be involved in a future Gas competition (tendering process) can sign up on the link below.

Sign up for Gas competition

Optional Registration on National Procurement Service website

NPS recommend that schools register as buyers on www.procurement.ie so that you can access information, including contact details and price lists for all NPS contacts in place.  Schools can email npswebsite@opw.ie and request to have their email address registered for the access to www.procurement.ie .  Once this is followed up registration will be confirmed.