Arrangements Update - April 2025

By Isobel Czislowski, Category Officer

The days are getting cooler, and the nights are getting longer, but here at Local Buy April brings with it a whole host of new activities for the Contracts Administration team. As the final stage of our tender cycle, this month the contracts administration team have been knee-deep in appointing and activating all the successful suppliers from our February round of tenders.

February recap

The February round of tenders saw a healthy number of suppliers applying for the first round of 2025. A total of 816 submissions were received across our 41 Arrangements.

We had one new Arrangement released in February, being our highly anticipated Quarries Arrangement LB341.

Appointment and activation overview

The appointment and activation stage of our tender cycle is where our Contracts Administration team shine. Their attention to detail, fantastic customer service and efficiency combine to ensure that all suppliers who submitted in the round are notified as to the outcome of their tender.

For those suppliers deemed successful in their application, the team builds their profile in our Customer Relationship Management tool and send out the all-important Confirmation of Acceptance. From here, each supplier is then invited to create their profile on VendorPanel for the relevant Arrangement they were successful on. The Contracts Administration team then link all applicable categories and service locations to each supplier profile, as well as review and approve compliance. Once these criteria have been met, then the team activate the supplier on VendorPanel.

There is a healthy amount of cross-collaboration and teamwork with other departments during these processes as well. The Contracts Administration team working closely with our Finance department to ensure that suppliers are promptly activated once their Supplier Verification fees are processed.

Looking Forward

The Category Officers and Category Managers are now looking forward to our next round of tenders, which will be opening on the 1st of May.

The team are busy building and reviewing the current list of Arrangements, as well as building some exciting new ones that will be included in the May round.

Stay tuned for what will undoubtedly be another exciting round of tenders in May!