Procurement description
The supplier will be required to deliver a comprehensive aged debt recovery service including, but not limited to:
• Initial review and assessment of all referred debt cases to determine recoverability, legal viability, proportionality of action, and potential barriers to recovery. This should include Identification of non-viable, uneconomic, or otherwise unrecoverable debts through an agreed process, where cases can be closed or returned to the Council without incurring full litigation or recovery fees.
• Recovery of Adult Social Care debt categorised as unpaid invoices outstanding for more than 90 days, with the majority of debts expected to have an age profile of between 1 and 6 years, which may include:
o Management of cases involving deceased debtors, including identification of executors, administrators, attorneys, deputies, or next of kin where appropriate.
o Tracing and engagement with next of Kin, estates, solicitors, probate practitioners and relevant third parties, and recovery activity relating to such processes
o Application of proportionate escalation processes, including pre-legal recovery activities and progression of legal recovery action only where considered viable, proportionate and authorised by the Council.
• Provision of secure information to include performance reporting and case updates to the Council in agreed formats and frequencies.
• Regular liaison with designated Council officers to review case progress, identify barriers to recovery, and agree appropriate next steps for complex, disputed, vulnerable or high-value cases.
Based on modelling of surplus referrals, defined as cases exceeding the capacity of the Council's in-house teams to actively and meaningfully manage, we estimate a referral volume of 296 cases over the initial 24-month contract period.
This estimate has been derived from referral and debt volumes observed over the previous three-year period. However, suppliers should demonstrate awareness of the variable nature of Adult Social Care debt and the factors that influence referral rates. Accordingly, bidders should demonstrate both an understanding of this variability and the operational flexibility to scale service delivery up or down in response to changing demand levels throughout the contract term.