WET News

16 WET NEWS APRIL 2019 | wwtonline.co.uk • The North-West company has revamped its procurement process going into AMP7 with its award-winning, market-led approach AI ANALYTICS Work: Introducing large-scale arti- ficial intelligence into the com- pany's operational systems with initial focus on drinking water Partners: EMAGIN Contract length: 8 years (to 2026) Contract value: Unknown CHEMICAL DOSING RIGS Work: Design, supply, delivery, installation and commissioning of new and replacement chemical dosing plants, chemical dosing rigs and containerised chemical dosing plants Partners: nmcn Contract length: 5 years (to 2020) Contract value: Unknown CLEAN UP, RESTORATION AND REINSTATEMENT SERVICES Work: Initial response, clean-up, restoration and reinstatement ser- vices in customers' properties Partners: Out for tender Contract length: 8 years Contract value: £16m DEBT COLLECTION SERVICES Work: Provision of debt recovery activities on behalf of United Utili- ties, including affordability visits and telephony activities, trace and collect services, tertiary doorstep visits and live debt Partners: Commercial Collection Services, Orbit Debt Collections, Pastdue Credit Solutions and Advantis Credit Contract length: Unknown Contract value: £19.5m DESIGN AND CONSTRUCT FRAMEWORK Work: Multidisciplinary activities including design, project manage- ment, construction, testing, com- missioning and maintenance of water and wastewater treatment works, pipelines, pumping sta- tions, reservoirs, and mechanical and electrical installations Partners: Mott MacDonald Bentley (MMB), Jacobs-CH2M and Volker- Stevin (C2V+), Balfour Beatty and Stantec (Advance), and Laing O'Rourke, Imtech and Atkins (LiMA) Contract length: 5 years (until 2020) with 6-year extension option Contract value: Unknown INDUSTRIAL CLEANING SERVICES Work: Sewage disposal; sewage, refuse, cleaning and environmen- tal; sewer cleaning; tank and res- e r v o i r c l e a n i n g ; a n d t a n k cleaning Partners: S E Coar Co, Andidrain, Sapphire Utility Solutions, Lanes Group, IWJSL, Future Industrial Services Contract length: Unknown Contract value: £2m MECHANICAL FITTINGS (80MM-1200MM) Work: Supply and delivery of mechanical fittings from 80mm to 1,200mm Partners: Out for tender Contract length: 8 years Contract value: £4.9m NETWORK MAINTENANCE Work: Maintaining sewer pipes, clean water infrastructure, private sewers, managing water diver- sions and delivering network enhancements Partners: Amey Contract length: 5-year extension (until 2020) Contract value: £225m NETWORK MAINTENANCE SERVICES Work: Services split across water core, wastewater core, non-core, water small projects, wastewater small projects, proactive inspec- tion and investigation, specialist water services and specialist wastewater services Partners: Out for tender Contract length: 6 years (with 4-year extension option) Contract value: £824m NETWORK MODELLING SERVICES Work: Water, wastewater and spe- cialist modelling Partners: Atkins, Mouchel, Stantec and RPS Environmental Contract length: 3 years (until 2020) Contract value: £24m SLUDGE TRANSPORT SERVICES Work: Provision of interworks tankering services to assist in- house fleet in managing variations in sludge production Partners: Andidrain, Future Indus- trial Services, J C and H J Arm- strong, S E Coar Co, S&C Foster, B P Mckeefry, Mulberry Waste, CJ & JM Huyton, SCG Utility Support, Hoylake Commercial Services, TR Handleys Contract length: 5 years (until 2023) with 3-year extension option Contract value: £19.2m WATER METERING SERVICES Work: Installing, maintaining and repairing water meters Partners: Amey Contract length: 5-year extension (until 2020) Contract value: £70m WEBSITE MAINTENANCE AND DEVELOPMENT Work: Support and maintenance will include incident fixes and problem management Partners: Mando Group Contract length: 8 years (until 2026) Contract value: £4m Contractor Factfile: United Utilities THE BUSINESS UU OPERATIONAL FACTS Area served: 15,041km2 Population served – water: 7.2m Population served – wastewater: 7.56m Annual turnover (2017/8): £1,716m Capital investment (2017/8): £814.5m Household connections – water: 3.12m Household connections - wastewater: 3.12m Water treatment works: 88 Wastewater treatment works: 568 Water mains length: 43,684km Sewers length: 77,339km WHAT THEY SAY UU is making use of a new market-testing method as it moves away from its reliance on frameworks and looks to adopt more expansive approaches, such as strategic relationships with suppliers, build-own-operate (BOO) type arrangements and direct market driven pricing approaches such as spot-buy. The Market Engagement Methodology (MEM), developed with the University of Salford and PwC, is designed to achieve best value from markets against every element of business cost, and the company says the approach has identified £359 million of cost savings for AMP7 compared to AMP5. "Our MEM approach is a procurement innovation based on the assumption that demonstrating a best value deal for 'the way we've always done things' is not enough because it risks ignoring best commercial practice, restraining innovation and leaving potential cost efficiencies unrealised," the company says. The MEM initiative is built around six core steps: testing priorities, business needs, test selection, testing, review and implementation. It seeks to go beyond standard practice to ask more fundamental questions that can lead to new routes of procurement and even redefine the product or service being procured. Among the 16 routes considered are outsource, direct procurement, joint venture, frameworks, spot buy and insource; as part of its PR19 submission, for example, United Utilities has proposed to deliver a scheme to improve the Haweswater Aqueduct using the direct procurement for customers approach. The MEM initiative won Best Process Improvement Initiative at the Chartered Institute of Procurement and Supply (CIPS) Supply Management Awards last year, and the company's Chris Lane said: "I am absolutely delighted that our hard work in building this innovative approach, which makes sure that we are getting best value with every penny we spend on behalf of customers, has been recognised with such a prestigious award." THE CONTRACTS

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