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Medical Agency Cascade

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Dear Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust,

In relation to your supply of medical (doctor) temporary workers, please could you provide the answers to the following questions?

1) Which locum/staffing agencies have you engaged to be part of your medical (doctors) agency cascade? Please provide the names of the agencies split into the relevant tiers. If you do not use a tier system, please explain how vacancies are cascaded with agencies.

2) Please provide a breakdown of the proportion of medical (doctor) locum hours booked through each of these tiers for the last three years. If this is not available, please provide a breakdown of the proportion of medical (doctor) locum spend incurred through each of these tiers for the last three years. If only recent years are available, please provide what you have.

3) What is the protocol for releasing medical (doctor) vacancies to each of your tiers?

4) When are the current arrangements relating to your agency cascade in place until?

Yours faithfully,

James King

Dear Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.

I am writing to request an internal review of Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust's handling of my FOI request 'Medical Agency Cascade'.

We are yet to hear back from you regarding our recent FOI request made on the 18th of March and have not even received an acknowledgement of receipt. We understand that due to the COVID-19 pandemic your response to this request will have been delayed, however it has been far longer than the standard 20 working days for you to provide the information requested.

Could you please provide an update on when this request will be processed?

Yours faithfully,

James King

FOI (HERTFORDSHIRE COMMUNITY NHS TRUST), Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust

Dear James,

Please could you provide a copy of your original request and we shall investigate this for you.

Kind regards,

Information Governance
Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust
Howard Court | 14 Tewin Road | Welwyn Garden City | AL7 1BW

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Dear FOI (HERTFORDSHIRE COMMUNITY NHS TRUST),

Dear Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust,

In relation to your supply of medical (doctor) temporary workers, please could you provide the answers to the following questions?

1) Which locum/staffing agencies have you engaged to be part of your medical (doctors) agency cascade? Please provide the names of the agencies split into the relevant tiers. If you do not use a tier system, please explain how vacancies are cascaded with agencies.

2) Please provide a breakdown of the proportion of medical (doctor) locum hours booked through each of these tiers for the last three years. If this is not available, please provide a breakdown of the proportion of medical (doctor) locum spend incurred through each of these tiers for the last three years. If only recent years are available, please provide what you have.

3) What is the protocol for releasing medical (doctor) vacancies to each of your tiers?

4) When are the current arrangements relating to your agency cascade in place until?

Yours faithfully,

James King

Yours sincerely,

James King

FOI (HERTFORDSHIRE COMMUNITY NHS TRUST), Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust

Dear James,

Thank you for your email.

We can confirm that your request was received and a response should have been made by 15th April 2021 within the 20 working day FOI timescale.

We shall endeavour to provide you the information as quickly as possible and provide a written response detailing the findings of our internal review.

Kind regards,

Information Governance
Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust
Howard Court | 14 Tewin Road | Welwyn Garden City | AL7 1BW

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VITTY, Martin (HERTFORDSHIRE COMMUNITY NHS TRUST), Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust

Dear James,

Thank you for your Freedom of Information enquiry, our reference FOI/2021/1418.

The Trust’s response is as follows (a response to your request for an internal review will be provided to you by the end of this month due to the staff involved in the investigation being unavailable):

1) Which locum/staffing agencies have you engaged to be part of your medical (doctors) agency cascade? Please provide the names of the agencies split into the relevant tiers. If you do not use a tier system, please explain how vacancies are cascaded with agencies.
We have minimal agency doctor usage at HCT, so we do not operate a cascade.
The one agency we use currently for the 1 doctor that we have, is an approved supplier and rates have been agreed through Herts Procurement.

2) Please provide a breakdown of the proportion of medical (doctor) locum hours booked through each of these tiers for the last three years. If this is not available, please provide a breakdown of the proportion of medical (doctor) locum spend incurred through each of these tiers for the last three years. If only recent years are available, please provide what you have.
Not applicable

3) What is the protocol for releasing medical (doctor) vacancies to each of your tiers?
Not applicable

4) When are the current arrangements relating to your agency cascade in place until?
Not applicable

Please note that the information provided remains the property of Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust and is therefore subject to Intellectual Property and Database Rights. In view of the Re-use of Public Sector Information Regulations, should you wish to re-use this information for commercial reasons, you are advised to obtain permission from us. Agreement to use the information for commercial reasons may incur a fee as the information is issued under licence. If you have any questions about the process, please do not hesitate to contact the Information Governance team in the first instance.

If you require further information please contact the Information Governance team. If you are dissatisfied with this response or wish to appeal, please write to:
The Director of Business Services
Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust
Unit 1A Howard Court
14 Tewin Road
Welwyn Garden City
Hertfordshire
AL7 1BW

If you still remain dissatisfied with our response, you may appeal to the Information Commissioner whose contact details are available together with further information about the Freedom of Information process at www.ico.org.uk
Kind Regards,

Information Governance
Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust
Howard Court | 14 Tewin Road | Welwyn Garden City | AL7 1BW

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Dear VITTY, Martin (HERTFORDSHIRE COMMUNITY NHS TRUST),

Thank you for informing me that you do not use a Tier system.

Please provide a breakdown of medical (doctor) locum hours booked, broken down by each of the locum agencies you have used. We would like this data split into each of the last three years. If this is not available, please provide a breakdown of spending by agency instead. If only more recent data is available, please provide what you have.

Yours sincerely,

James King

FOI (HERTFORDSHIRE COMMUNITY NHS TRUST), Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust

Dear James,

Thank you for your Freedom of Information enquiry, our reference FOI/2021/1469.

We will respond by 8th July 2021.

Kind regards,

Information Governance
Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust
Howard Court | 14 Tewin Road | Welwyn Garden City | AL7 1BW

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VITTY, Martin (HERTFORDSHIRE COMMUNITY NHS TRUST), Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust

1 Attachment

Dear James,
Thank you for your Freedom of Information enquiry, our reference FOI/2021/1469.
The Trust’s response is as follows:

Please provide a breakdown of medical (doctor) locum hours booked, broken down by each of the locum agencies you have used. We would like this data split into each of the last three years. If this is not available, please provide a breakdown of spending by agency instead. If only more recent data is available, please provide what you have.

Dates run:

• 2018 No Data Available
• 1st January -31st December 2019
• 1st January – 31st December 2020
• 1st January – 17th June 2021 (year to date)

Data:
• Agency
• Total Locum Hours Supplied / Worked
• Total Locum Charge
• Total Agency Margin separated (not including Locum Cost)

Please see attached word file due to HTML issues encountered with the What do they know system.

Please note that the information provided remains the property of Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust and is therefore subject to Intellectual Property and Database Rights. In view of the Re-use of Public Sector Information Regulations, should you wish to re-use this information for commercial reasons, you are advised to obtain permission from us. Agreement to use the information for commercial reasons may incur a fee as the information is issued under licence. If you have any questions about the process, please do not hesitate to contact the Information Governance team in the first instance.
If you require further information please contact the Information Governance team. If you are dissatisfied with this response or wish to appeal, please write to:
The Director of Business Services
Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust
Unit 1A Howard Court
14 Tewin Road
Welwyn Garden City
Hertfordshire
AL7 1BW
If you still remain dissatisfied with our response, you may appeal to the Information Commissioner whose contact details are available together with further information about the Freedom of Information process at www.ico.org.uk
Kind Regards,

Information Governance
Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust
Howard Court | 14 Tewin Road | Welwyn Garden City | AL7 1BW

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We don't know whether the most recent response to this request contains information or not – if you are James King please sign in and let everyone know.