August 2007

ECHG (English Churches Housing Group)

In 2003 ECHG (English Churches Housing Group) decided to enter into a 5 year Partnering agreement to carry out improvements to kitchens and bathrooms within its national housing stock under the Government’s Decent Homes initiative. It also decided to enter into a 5 year Partnering contract for cyclical redecoration works to these properties quite separately but at the same time.  Adverts were placed in the trade press and OJEU notices were issued giving details of the works and inviting suitably experienced contractors to apply. CLC applied for both projects and were sent a pre-qualification document to complete for each project.

The pre-qualification document sought to establish the contractor’s attitude to and understanding of Partnering, best value, customer care, continuous improvement and open book accounting. A shortlist of suitable contractors established from the questionnaire responses was drawn up for each project and invited to attend and make a presentation to the housing association and its advisors. CLC were shortlisted for both projects.

At each presentation CLC explained that whilst a single point of contact responsible for coordinating the project would be provided, the works would be carried out through its national network of branch offices which each had its own management team and directly employed operatives capable of the works to be carried out in that geographic area. We were able to demonstrate that our core business philosophy has been to develop long term relationships with end user clients to mutual benefit and that we had vast experience of working in occupied property.

Following the presentations further shortlists were drawn up which consisted of other privately owned and publicly quoted companies capable of providing a national service. At that stage CLC were invited to complete a pricing matrix indicating the overhead and profit mark up we required in addition to the direct costs of the works completed.

Following the pricing submission CLC were awarded both the Kitchen and Bathroom replacement contract and the Cyclical Redecoration contract.

We then, together with the client, its advisors and our key suppliers created a strategic working group for each project to set out the aims and objectives of the contracts and the procedures to be used to ensure that they were achieved. Workshops were held at which both the client’s, CLC’s and key supplier’s staff from each geographic area attended to ensure that they understood what was required, took ownership of the processes needed to deliver success and established good working relationships from the outset.

The contracts have worked smoothly throughout, delivering to the Housing Association the benefits it had hoped for when it decided to go down the partnering route including greatly improved resident satisfaction and delivering to CLC the benefits of a long term relationship including continuity of work.