6th April 2011, 11:33 AM
As someone who has, over the years, worked for a number of commercial and local authority units - all I can say is that in my experience, it was whilst working for the local authority units that I tended to experience more requests for additional work/sampling/trenching or reports rejected for not meeting requirements than when with commercial units. Despite being employed by the same authority, the council units were a separate team from the DC/HER teams usually housed in separate buildings with a distinct and again separate management structure. It was a common complaint amongst staff in the local council units I've worked for that our collegues in DC/HER made 'requests' for us to carryout addition work either in the field or during P/X that weren't asked of our competing private contractors - simply because we did work for the same authority and they perhaps felt they could get away with making such requests.
Sometimes we'd feel we were being used as guinea-pigs to test the waters for new requirements and that they came down hard on us - simply because we were the local authority unit.
As for tendering and undercutting competitors because we happened to work for the same authority - sorry, didn't/doesn't happen. We'd lose jobs just like other units on price - even if we carried out the initial evaluation stage. If local authority units did have an unfair advantage and were able to routinely undercut competitors - and presumably make some dosh in the process - would we be discusing the demise of local authority units?
Or would we have a thread moaning about the cartel of council units forcing the commercial sector to its knees?
Sometimes we'd feel we were being used as guinea-pigs to test the waters for new requirements and that they came down hard on us - simply because we were the local authority unit.
As for tendering and undercutting competitors because we happened to work for the same authority - sorry, didn't/doesn't happen. We'd lose jobs just like other units on price - even if we carried out the initial evaluation stage. If local authority units did have an unfair advantage and were able to routinely undercut competitors - and presumably make some dosh in the process - would we be discusing the demise of local authority units?
Or would we have a thread moaning about the cartel of council units forcing the commercial sector to its knees?