As the Home Office embarks on driving home validation of cashable and non-cashable savings on all goods and services, Mercato reports that 38% of English Police Forces are already ahead of the agenda on IT, using a simple IT buyer’s tool to validate and drive down the cost of purchase by up to 24%.
Further Forces are in the final stages of evaluating the CIPS accredited Mercato technology.
Mercato ITelligence delivers cashable and non-cashable savings on IT budgets by advising users of trade guide price and UK supply chain stock levels. It helps people negotiate from a position of knowledge to drive down the cost of buying IT.
With IT representing one of the largest areas of indirect procurement spend and pressures from Government reform on spend and efficiency, procurers are being tasked with driving down costs in this vertical as a priority.
However, the highly volatile IT market is testing IT buyers looking for sustained best value as product price and availability change on a daily basis.
Forces such as Nottinghamshire Police, Durham, Cumbria, Devon & Cornwall Constabularies have implemented the price policing solution and organisations regularly identify savings of 3 – 24% on IT purchases. It is also delivering more efficient ways of working, reducing time previously spent manually calling and benchmarking suppliers and products.
Mercato ITelligence shortens the benchmarking and buying cycle whilst empowering purchasers to quickly validate with reports that best value is being reached on every purchase. Buyers simply input their preferred supplier product lists or spot checks online for an automated comparison to trade guide price and stock of over 150,000 products from 2,500 manufacturers within the UK IT supply chain.
Mercato Head of Benchmarking, Al Nagar, said: “Quickly reducing the cost of buying IT from a price and process perspective is critical at this time. So is validation of best value on every purchase. For the first time, Police Forces can genuinely report and qualify that they are delivering the savings they know they are achieving.
“Uniquely, the solution supports buyers in meeting their objectives of saving money from the moment they use it to benchmark an IT purchase. Police Forces that take a progressive approach to IT, procurement and finance are switching on to the bottom line benefits fast.”