Extension of Road User Charging Business Operations Services (BOps)

Award outcome

Description

This Contract Award Notice is issued in accordance with the Procurement Act 2023 to notify the market of the award decision and to formally commence the standstill period for the provision of Business Operations (BOps) services supporting Road User Charging (RUC). The BOps contract provides: - processing of payments; - multi-channel customer interactions; - the receipt, handling and verification of associated records; and - interfaces with enforcement operations systems and other RUC systems. The services operate within TfL's live RUC environment and form part of a highly complex and integrated operational ecosystem, supporting critical public-facing and statutory functions including charging, enforcement, and customer account management. This award enables service continuity while TfL undertakes a competitive procurement for a future combined Business and Enforcement Operations (BEOps) contract and ensures sufficient time for procurement, mobilisation, system integration, testing, and safe transition. In accordance with the Procurement Act 2023, a mandatory standstill period of 8 working days applies. The Authority will not enter into the contract before the end of this standstill period. The extension to the BOps Contract will be a direct award under section 41 and Schedule 5 of the Procurement Act 2023. This is on the basis that paragraph 7 of Schedule 5 (Additional or repeat goods, services or works - extension) applies. The grounds for this justification are set out in this section. The existing BOps services are delivered through highly complex, proprietary and tightly integrated systems embedded within TfL's live RUC environment. The BOps system and the interfaced Enforcement Operations (EOps) system support critical functions of RUC including charging, payments, enforcement and customer account management, operating continuously at significant scale. The BOps services are supplied as part of an interdependent architecture with tightly coupled data, systems and business processes, such that partial replacement or separation would not be technically feasible without material redesign. The BOps system and interfaces have been configured, integrated and optimised during the term of the contract for the requirements of RUC and rely on supplier-specific operational knowledge, configuration and control which cannot be replicated without substantial technical intervention. The services are dependent on a deeply integrated technical architecture comprising bespoke system components, interfaces, data structures and operational configurations that have been developed and refined during the term. These components are fully embedded within TfL's RUC systems and are not capable of being separated or re‑provided independently without material technical intervention. The scope and overall nature of the BOps services will remain substantially unchanged during the proposed extension. A change of supplier at this stage would necessitate the replacement or substantial re-engineering of core system components and interfaces. This would result in incompatibility with existing systems and infrastructure and would give rise to disproportionate technical difficulties in operation, maintenance, data integrity and service continuity. In particular, transition to an alternative supplier would introduce significant risks relating to system interoperability, operational resilience and enforcement accuracy. Accordingly, the continued supply of services by Capita is necessary to ensure compatibility with the existing technical environment and to avoid disproportionate technical and operational disruption. The conditions set out in paragraph 7 of Schedule 5 of the Procurement Act 2023 are therefore satisfied and TfL considers that it may directly award the extension to Capita. The proposed extension is for an initial term of 5 years, with a limited optional extension to a maximum of 7 years. This reflects the minimum period strictly necessary to: - complete a compliant competitive procurement process; - design and implement a replacement service model and technical architecture; and - undertake safe, controlled and phased transition to a new supplier Shorter contract durations have been carefully considered but rejected, as they would: - materially increase technical and transition risk; - constrain the ability of bidders to design and mobilise a viable and compliant solution; and - undermine effective competition by reducing the feasibility of market entry and delivery TfL will have rights to terminate the extended BOps Contract, enabling TfL to transition to a replacement supplier at the earliest point at which it is technically feasible and operationally safe to do so, for example if mobilisation and testing take less time than the current programme assumptions allow for. This ensures that the duration of the extension represents a maximum necessary period rather than a fixed commitment. For these reasons, TfL considers that the length of the proposed extension is necessary and proportionate and has taken commercial steps to ensure that if the procurement and mobilisation of the supplier of the new BEOps contract is achieved on a shorter programme than currently assumed, there are means to transition to the BEOps contract as soon as practicable.

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