Spend on Office Supplies and associated Products

Hello,

Thank you for getting in touch with the EWR Co team.

We try to deal with enquiries within ten working days though it may take longer if we need to ask several colleagues for information. We'll keep you up-to-date if that's the case.

Kind regards,
EWR Co Team East West Railway Company Limited is a company registered in England and Wales. Registered office: The Quadrant, Elder Gate, Central Milton Keynes, MK9 1EN. Company registration number: 11072935.

Thank you for getting in touch with the EWR Co team.

We try to deal with enquiries within ten working days though it may take
longer if we need to ask several colleagues for information. We'll keep
you up to date if that's the case.

Kind regards,
EWR Co Team East West Railway Company Limited is a company registered in
England and Wales. Registered office: The Quadrant, Elder Gate, Milton
Keynes, United Kingdom, MK9 1EN. Company registration number: 11072935.

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Dear Alexander James,

Thank you for your interest in East West Rail. 

We are in receipt of your email of 18.04.24 and we are treating it as a
Freedom of Information request. 

The Freedom of Information Act and Environmental Information Regulations
oblige us to respond to requests for information within 20 working days of
the day we received your message, but we aim to respond to all enquiries
as quickly as we can.

Please do get in contact if you have any further questions quoting our
ref: CS-00196468.

Leanne Nuttall
FOI Officer | Legal & Corporate Governance

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Dear Alexander James, 

I am writing regarding your Freedom of Information Request, our reference
CS-00196468.

We require clarity around the information that you have requested and are
asking for further details from you to identify and locate the
information.
 

• You asked “The details I require are: Spend on Office supplies and
associated products for the below financial years.”  Could you be more
specific on your criteria for ‘Office supplies’.

• It then becomes unclear whether you are requesting information
specifically relating to contracts we have in place with office supply
companies.  Could you please confirm?

• You asked for the “…name of Incumbent Supplier?”, then ask “How long
have you traded with them?”  Please clarify who you are referring to?

• Please advise further what information you request for ‘Tail End
Spend’.

Once we have received clarification, we will be able to begin to process
your request.

Please note that, under section 1(3) of the Freedom of Information Act
2000, a public authority need not comply with a request unless any further
information reasonably required to locate the information is supplied. 

If we do not hear further from you within 2 months, we will consider the
request closed. Please note that the 20 working day response period will
not start until a satisfactory reply constituting a valid request is
received.

Yours sincerely, 

Leanne Nuttall
FOI Officer
East West Railway Company

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Hello,

Thank you for getting in touch with the EWR Co team.

We try to deal with enquiries within ten working days though it may take longer if we need to ask several colleagues for information. We'll keep you up-to-date if that's the case.

Kind regards,
EWR Co Team East West Railway Company Limited is a company registered in England and Wales. Registered office: The Quadrant, Elder Gate, Central Milton Keynes, MK9 1EN. Company registration number: 11072935.

Dear Alexander James,

Thank you for clarifying your Freedom of Information request. 

We will continue to progress this, and would like to advise that the 20
working day timescale has been reset.

Please do get in contact if you have any further questions quoting our
ref: CS-00196468.

Leanne Nuttall
FOI Officer | Legal & Corporate Governance

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Dear Alexander James,

Re: Freedom of Information Request

Thank you for your request for information, which was received on
18.04.24, our reference CS-00196468.

In that request, you asked us for the information below:

The details I require are:
Spend on Office supplies and associated products for the below financial
years.
1st April 2022 – 31st March 2023
1st April 2023 – 31st March 2024
Start date & duration of Contract?
Is there an extension clause in the contract and, if so, the duration
of the extension?
Has a decision been made yet on whether the contract is to be either
extended or renewed?
Who is the senior officer (outside of procurement) responsible for the
contract?
Name of Incumbent Supplier?
How long have you traded with them?
If you publish your register of contracts and purchasing, can you please
provide a website link.
In addition, can you confirm if you have a contract in place for Tail End
Spend.

We wrote to you on 26.04.24 to ask for clarification:

“We require clarity around the information that you have requested and are
asking for further details from you to identify and locate the
information.

You asked “The details I require are: Spend on Office supplies and
associated products for the below financial years.”  Could you be more
specific on your criteria for ‘Office supplies’.

It then becomes unclear whether you are requesting information
specifically relating to contracts we have in place with office supply
companies.  Could you please confirm?

You asked for the “…name of Incumbent Supplier?”, then ask “How long have
you traded with them?”  Please clarify who you are referring to?

Please advise further what information you request for ‘Tail End Spend’.”

You replied on the 29.04.24 with the following clarification:

Thank you for your email, to clarify I would like information on your
spend on Office Supplies (stationery), Paper, Ink and Toner.
Ideally all spend that is identified under the following CPV Code.
30000000 – Office and computing machinery, equipment and supplies except
furniture and software packages
I had added a description below.

Office and computing machinery, equipment and supplies except furniture
and software packages code description
The category “Office and computing machinery, equipment and supplies
except furniture and software packages” encompasses a wide range of
products and items that are essential for office operations and computing
needs. It includes office machinery, equipment, and supplies, excluding
computers, printers, and furniture. This category covers items such as
photocopiers, scanners, shredders, paper, stationery, writing instruments,
and other office essentials. Additionally, it includes computer equipment
and supplies, such as monitors, keyboards, mice, cables, and other
peripherals
Tail-end spend refers to ad hoc spending and uncategorized supplier
purchases that are low in volume, frequency or value. It is also defined
as the 20% of non-core transactions that are left unmanaged. Tail-end
spend usually accumulates through low-value transactions companies engage
in with their suppliers, though they do not occur frequently. The most
common definition for tail-end spend is the 80/20 rule, where tail-end
spend is typically defined as 80% of the company’s transactions that only
account for around 20% of the actual total company spend.

I can confirm that the search for the information you requested has been
completed and I can advise you of the following:

The EWR Co ledger is not set up to identify the specific definition
provided in this FOI.  We do not use CPV Code 30000000. 

We record office supply spend as categorised on our main ledger under:

• Office Supplies – C52171000G
• IT & Computer Equipment – C11410000
• Postage and Courier - C52171000D
• Printing & Publication - C52171000F

As some entries contain capital spend on office supply items (under your
definition) and computer equipment, we would have to manually retrieve the
invoices relevant to those entries to identify the actual spend on office
supplies within the scope of your request.

Further office supplies transactions have been placed across company
credit cards. This means that the only record we hold of such information
is held in the credit card portal. Only the Head of Finance is able to
download the required information from this portal. He would need to run a
separate report for each month of the year. The 12 files, once extracted,
will separately cover the activity on 10 credit cards. This means 120
monthly statements will need to be reviewed and a judgement made as to
whether the cost identified needs to be captured for this return or not.
This will need to be reviewed by a second person to ensure the information
has been accurately captured.

We estimate that it would take approximately 30 minutes of the Head of
Finances times to download the required information.

We estimate that it would take approximately 10 minutes per each of the
120 files to determine, and record, if Office Supplies were purchased.
Plus another two hours for this work to be reviewed and for spend recorded
against the ledger, incurred via Purchase Orders, to also be assessed and
added to the Credit Card cost.

Therefore, if these files were examined, I estimate that fulfilling your
request would take a minimum of 22 hours and 30 mins.

The appropriate cost limit for handling a Freedom of Information request
is specified in the Fees Regulations, and for local authorities it is set
at £450, the equivalent of one member of staff working on a request for 18
hours at a fixed rate of £25 per hour.

Based on this, your request would take a minimum of 22.5 hours at a rate
greater than £25 per hour and therefore it will cost more than the
appropriate limit.

Consequently, we are not obliged by the Freedom of Information Act to
respond to your request, as explained in Section 12(1).

I have considered how to narrow the scope of your request, so that we may
be able to provide information free of charge and be within the
appropriate limit, regrettably given the way in which the information is
held in our systems, I am unable to offer any meaningful advice concerning
how to refine your request. I have therefore concluded that no further
information is therefore available within the appropriate limit.

If, however, you are able to see an alternative, then please do let us
know. Any new request that we receive from you will be treated as a fresh
Freedom of Information request.

If you wish to discuss any of the above, please contact us.

If you are unhappy with the service that you have received in relation to
your request, and wish to request a review of our response, you should
write to FOI Review, East West Railway Company Limited, The Quadrant,
Elder Gate, Milton Keynes, MK9 1EN, or by email to
[1][email address].

If you are unhappy with the service that you have received following an
internal review, you have the right to ask the Information Commissioner’s
Office (ICO) to review our decision. The Information Commissioner’s Office
can be contacted at: The Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe
House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF. You can find further
information on the ICO website here: [2]www.ico.org.uk.

Yours sincerely,

Leanne Nuttall
FOI Officer | Legal & Corporate Governance

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