Cruise Services and Berthing Support Staff - Portsmouth International Port - Soft Marketing Testing

Portsmouth City Council (the 'Council') is seeking to engage in pre-procurement soft market testing discussions with suitably qualified and experienced contractors in respect of a forthcoming contracting opportunity concerning the provision of cruise services and berthing support staff at Portsmouth International Port (the 'Port'). The Council currently has separate contracts in place for cruise services and berthing support staff at Portsmouth International Port, and these contracts are due to end in May 2025. The Council requires a contractor to continue to carry out these services once the current contracts end. The contractor needs to be able to operate on a dynamic basis as the cruise and berthing programmes can be subject to change at short notice due to factors like the weather. Furthermore, the Council will not be able to provide a binding guarantee per annum value for either of the contracts. The Council is considering undertaking a single lotted procurement process for these contracts, which will result in the letting of separate contracts for each of the service provision. The Council is considering a lotting strategy where Lot 1 is for the provision of cruise service, Lot 2 is for the provision of berthing support staff services and Lot 3 is for the provision of cruise and berthing support staff services combined. An award via Lot 3 will still result in 2 separate contracts, a concession contract for cruise services and a service contract for berthing support staff. The Council envisages entering into a 4-year contract for each of the contracts, extendable by a further 6 years in increments to be agreed. The full scope of services will formally commence on the go live date of 1st June 2025. The Council envisages securing the contractor/s in line with the following draft summary procurement programme, however it should be noted that the dates below are purely indicative and may be subject to future change. The Council will run the procurement process in accordance with the 'Open Procedure' as defined within the Public Contracts Regulations (2015): • Soft market testing - August 2024 • Issue FTS Contract Notice - 7th October 2024 • Issue procurement documents via In-tend - 7th October 2024 • Tender submission deadline - 22nd November 2024 • Award decision notification - 6th January 2024 • Standstill period completes - 16th January 2024 • Contract award notice - 3rd February 2025 • Mobilisation - from 3rd March 2025 • Commencement of full services - 1st June 2025 The Council would like to engage in 1-1 meetings with suitably qualified and experienced contractors who have sufficient current experience of working within a maritime and shipping environment ideally this will include the provision of stevedoring services in a passenger environment, to gain feedback on several elements of the proposed procurement and contract strategy.
The Council has capacity to undertake a maximum of 6, 1 hour 1-1 meetings at the following dates and times: 14th August 2024 - 09:30 hours - 10:30 hours 14th August 2024 - 11:00 hours - 12:00 hours 15th August 2024 - 09:30 hours - 10:30 hours 15th August 2024 - 11:00 hours - 12:00 hours 16th August 2024 - 13:00 hours - 14:00 hours 16th August 2024 - 14:30 hours - 15:30 hours As capacity is limited meetings will be allocated on a first come first served basis. Whilst the Council may seek to accommodate requests from contractors for additional meeting dates & times it cannot provide any guarantees. Contractors interested in taking part in a 1-1 meeting are required to provide the following details via In-tend correspondence using the Expression of Interest form accessible via the In-tend 'Cruise Services and Berthing Support Staff - Portsmouth International Port - Soft Market Testing' project by no later than 12th August 2024 17:00. The In-tend system can be accessed free of charge via the following web link: https://intendhost.co.uk/portsmouthcc/aspx/home