Guidance updated on set up a commercial or digital and technology spend controls pipeline

Monday, 24 July 2023 09:50

Follow this guidance to create forward-looking pipelines for the current versions of the commercial and digital and technology spend controls processes. From: Cabinet Office Published 30 April 2018 Last updated 24 July 2023 — See all updates Contents Purpose of pipelines Pipeline templates Help creating pipelines You can read the definition of pipelines and the qualifying criteria in the spend...Request free trial

Follow this guidance to create forward-looking pipelines for the current versions of the commercial and digital and technology spend controls processes.

From:

Cabinet Office

Published

30 April 2018

Last updated

24 July 2023 — See all updates

Contents

You can read the definition of pipelines and the qualifying criteria in the spend controls policy summary.

Purpose of pipelines

Your organisation must create and maintain pipelines showing future activity to follow the current versions of the commercial and digital and technology spend controls processes. Pipelines help your organisation to:

see all commercial, digital and technology spend activity
plan resourcing and capability requirements
improve spend planning and transparency for your management team
focus expertise on spend activities that require more oversight, allowing you to spot patterns or duplicated spend within your organisation
reduce retrospective spend requests
plan for extensions, renewals, and new requirements earlier
promote assurance activity that is sensible and proportionate

Overlap between pipelines

You can overlap commercial pipelines with digital and technology pipelines. For example, when digital and technology activity totals £10 million or over, you must feature this activity on both pipelines during the triaging process. You should work jointly with the Central Digital and Data Office (CDDO) and the Cabinet Office Central Commercial Teams to ask for approval.

You must include any ongoing activity that could incur future spend in both pipelines, even if you have not secured funding. This includes Independent Shared Service Centres activity, for example, current or new back office/administrative systems a website or service such as hosting, data centres, voice and video, security expenditure related to PSN.

Pipeline templates

Your organisation must record activities on your pipelines, and you should add new spend to your pipeline as soon as possible.

You must make sure planned spend is included in your pipeline and within scope of the respective controls. You do not need to include existing contracts that you are not replacing in the pipeline.

The Cabinet Office has developed 2 templates of what you should include in commercial and digital and technology pipelines, at a minimum.

Commercial pipeline template

Field	What to include (if applicable)
Reference number	Enter the unique organisation reference number, if applicable.
Business area	Enter the business area/organisation owner for this contract.
Short description	A short contextual entry about the activity. This should reference how the activity delivers your organisation’s strategy and what is being purchased. Please reference the overarching programme when relevant.
Contract title	The planned or published activity name
Commercial strategy	The commercial strategy or approach for the commercial activity. Potential options include: 1. New requirement 2. Re-procurement (same scope) 3. Re-procurement (different scope) 4. Extension
Existing contract end date	Enter the end date of the existing contract, for example, the first date that the contract needs replacing. If this is a new requirement, please enter N/A if not applicable.
Next Business Case Stage	You should include your business case, either in its strategic outline, rough draft, or full outline.
Planned date for next business case stage	Enter a valid date for your next business case.
Procurement start date	Enter your procurement procedure start date. For example, the release of OJEU or commencement of a further competition under a framework agreement.
Contract start date	Enter a valid start date for your new contract.
New contract end date (excluding options)	Enter a valid end date of the new contract. This excludes options, for example, options for extension.
Value of new contract (excluding options)	Enter the £ value of the new contract. This excludes any value associated with options for extension.
Procurement sourcing route	The procurement vehicle being used to source the contract. Options include Framework, OJEU, below OJEU and Dynamic Purchasing Systems.
Level of competition	How did you award your supplier contract? For example, was there a competitive tender, a mini-competition, a single source or a direct award?
Spend category	You should classify the type of work you’re doing with the spend. This can be from any system your organisation uses as a standard practice, including CAS, CPV, UNSPSC.
Contract tiering	You should include the contract tier classification as per your organisation preference and outline the level of risk, for example, Tier 1,2,3 / Gold, Silver, Bronze.
Existing Supplier	Enter the name of your current supplier of the service, if applicable.
Which functional standards apply	Enter the type of Cabinet Office spend controls that apply. For example, digital and technology, commercial or property.
Assessment against functional standards (triage)	Your spend will have been assessed by your organisation. It will either be assured, monitor, control, or pending.
Senior Responsible Owner	Enter the Senior Responsible Owner for each contract or spend activity.
Main Contact	Enter the name and contact details of the single point of contact.

Digital and technology pipeline template

Download a template of the digital and technology pipeline

Field	What to include (Compulsory fields are marked)
Programme identifier	To improve data quality departments should give every line a unique reference number. Programme identifiers are optional.
Project identifier (compulsory)	You must have a project identifier. To improve data quality departments should give every line a unique reference number.
Department (compulsory)	Enter a shortened name of the department. This should be well-known like DEFRA or MOD.
Area (compulsory)	This should be the arm’s length body (ALB) or directorate.
Project name (compulsory)	Enter the full name of the project.
Requires service assessment	Enter whether this spend requires a service assessment. This could be: CDDO Internal No TBC
Assurance level (compulsory)	Enter the Assurance Level. This will be one of the following: Assured Monitor Control Pending Information (this is for information only)
Assurance level reason (compulsory)	Enter a reason for the assurance level referencing the Technology Code of Practice and the digital and technology spend controls pipeline assessment criteria. Enter N/A if not applicable You should enter any monitor or control reasons here. If there is a change in the assurance level this should be noted here.
Digital pipeline reference	If a project or programme is marked as control and put through for assurance by the STA, record the case number here.
Spend control type	Enter either Digital (public facing) or Technology (internal facing) Novel or Contentious. If a project has a digital element, then the whole spend should be treated as digital spend. Only one selection should be made.
Description (compulsory)	Enter a short 100 word description about the activity. This should reference how the activity delivers your organisation’s strategy and what is being purchased. You should reference the overarching programme when relevant. You can use the following structure: Objectives Outcomes Benefits Timescales
Service	What digital service is this project part of? Enter N/A if not applicable.
Spend start date	Enter the date that the spend is due to start. This can be an estimated date that may change. Use the format 21/11/2020.
Most recent review date	Enter the last date the service or activity was reviewed. Use the format 21/11/2020.
Next Review date	Enter the next date the project, programme, product, activity or service will be reviewed. Use the format 21/11/2020.
First alpha assessment date	For digital services this will be the date of its first alpha assessment. This should take place within 3 months of the spend start date. Use the format 21/11/2020. If there is no alpha assessment enter N/A.
Public beta start	Enter the expected date of the public beta launch. This can be an estimated date. Use the format 21/11/2020. If there is no public beta start enter N/A.
Date expected live	This is the expected date of live. For a digital service this will be a successful live service assessment. For a technology project, this will be when the service is available. This can be an estimated date. Use the format 21/11/2020.
Project phase	Enter the project phase. This should be one of the following: Pre-Discovery Discovery Alpha Private Beta Beta Live Paused Stopped
Business case phase	Enter the business case phase: Strategic Outline Business Case (SOBC) Outline Business case (OBC) Full Business Case (FBC) Programme Business Case (PBC) N/A if not applicable
Approved cost	This should be the approved cost exclusive of VAT. If you have projects and programmes then this will only be populated at the project level. Use the format 2,000,165. If you want to include £, make sure the cells are formatted to the ‘currency’ setting.
Cost comment	Any comments around the approved cost.
Estimated lifetime spend	For a digital project this is the cost from discovery to live. For a technology project this is total spend. Use the format 2,000,165. If you want to include £, make sure the cells are formatted to the ‘currency’ setting.
Estimated lifetime spend comment	Add any comments regarding estimated life time spend.
Savings introduced	Your CDDO Senior DDaT Adviser will provide a framework, which you can use to assess savings on pipeline items. These savings will then be assured by CDDO.
Status	Open - Still spending the money. Closed - Money has been spent or the request has been rejected. Paused - Project is not spending money currently but is expected to resume. Pending - Project is known about but has not yet started spending money. You can choose to keep open and closed items on the same sheet, or on a separate sheet in the same document. Please note if your department manages through programmes and projects then you will have open and closed items on the pipeline. If you are running separate sheets, the closed projects should only be moved when a programme as a whole is closed.
SRO (compulsory)	Enter the name of the Senior Responsible Owner (SRO). This can be a full name or an email.
Contact or Project Manager	Enter the name of the main contact. This can be a full name or an email. This may be a duplicate if they are also the SRO.
Comments	This is a free text column to add any additional information. You should aim to use tags when adding comments. Enter tags at the end of the comments using the following format: TAGS: Legacy, AI
Commercial pipeline reference	Enter a reference if it’s on the commercial pipeline.
Commercial approach	How do you intend to procure the services required? For example: Open tender Direct award Extension Other (please specify)
Route to market	Enter the commercial framework or other route to market being used: Commercial Framework OJEU Other
Suppliers	List all suppliers delivering this project using a comma separated list. For example, company x, company y, company z
Contract end date	For multiple contracts then it should be the next one which expires.
Contract supplier comment	Add any comments relating to contracts or suppliers.
Will the project change or create a citizen facing website?	Create Change No change Enter N/A if not applicable
What is the proposed or existing URL	If you are creating or updating an existing website, tell us the domain name.

Help creating pipelines

You should note that it may take time for you to create your pipelines, and maintaining them is an ongoing process.

If you need help developing a commercial pipeline you can work with the GCF Central Commercial Team. Email commercialassurance@cabinetoffice.gov.uk to find out which Commercial Business Partner is assigned to your organisation.

If you need help developing a digital and technology pipeline you can work with a CDDO senior DDaT adviser. Email cddoassurance@digital.cabinet-office.gov.uk to find out which senior technology adviser is assigned to your organisation.