Category: People

Customers & People in General

2017 Procurement Research

What concerns have Irish SMEs about Brexit, Trump, Blockchain etc ?
The 2017 Arvo Procurement research was developed to collate responses from Irish SMEs to clarify the impact from Trump policies, technological advances such as Blockchain, plus the true fallout from Brexit. Ratings agency Moody’s recently sounded a warning note about the threats to the Irish economy from Brexit and the Trump administration, particularly as Ireland was the “European country most exposed” to the two factors. The agency says the changing international environment are “key risks” for Ireland’s otherwise improving circumstances, while Brexit could be more disruptive to Ireland than initially thought (due to the hard exit outcome currently being negotiated).

 

With regards the survey findings;

  1. 100% of the Irish SMEs think that their insurance costs will increase in 2017, what about you?
  2. 26% of the Irish SMEs think that Brexit will increase currency costs and so impact their business
  3. While the top “2017 Priorities” for Irish SMEs are revenue growth and profit growth.;

The majority of Businesses surveyed during this research;

    1. Do not have a procurement function or role within their companies
    2. Do not have a budget for procurement systems and training
    3. While tasks relating to “banking and payments or documentation, order process” are potentials to automate today.

 

To review the complete report, please use this download link: https://bit.ly/2msMirM

 

 

As always please feel free to contact us if you have any queries about this survey and any procurement challenges or opportunities within your business.

Correct Your Electricity Bills

AIB recently announced a €100 million Fund for businesses to complete energy efficiency projects, after researching that one third of SMEs do not understand their energy bills and 86 per cent do not know how to lower them. As energy prices are on an upward trend, there is an increasing need for businesses to effectively manage energy costs. Reducing utility costs is still one of the most effective and achievable strategies for lowering business operating costs.

It would seem also that lots of businesses are on the incorrect Electricity Tariff while their fixed charges may be inaccurate also. Mike McGrath, Managing Director of Arvo Cost Management commented “We see this every day. Some businesses are actually on the incorrect Electricity tariff and therefore are paying more for their electricity than they need to be. In one case in particular, we corrected a tariff for one business saving them €39,087 annually, while this week we corrected Tariffs on a daily basis for our clients”.

An even simpler technique is to ensure your fixed charges are correct. Every energy bill has fixed and variable charges, so start by ensuring your fixed charges are accurate and competitive. For example, your Maximum Import Capacity (MIC) Charges relate to the kilovolt ampere (Kva) connection and maximum load between your electricity account and ESB Networks. Mr. McGrath continues, “some businesses are not set at the correct MIC level and pay either penalty fees or excess charges on their bills as a result. We recently corrected the MIC for one client who was paying an excess of €2,067 per month. Worryingly for Irish Businesses, up until recently, we could ascertain this MIC Data from ESB Networks but now they no longer provide this information, ensuring it is difficult for businesses to correct their Maximum Import Capacity.

“This practice is not unique to the Energy Market, we observe discrepancies in billing on Telecom, Stationery and service-based invoices. This often occurs as the Purchaser, User and Payer of a particular product or service within a business, are rarely the same person.”

Contact us today if you feel like it is the right time to review your electricity bills.

What is RFx?

As a Procurement Service listed on our marketing materials and website, the most common query we receive from clients reviewing our services is, what is RFx? To which we reply, “RFx does not stand for anything specifically; as the RF stands for “Request For” and the x is just a placeholder for I, P, B, T and / or Q i.e;

  • Request for Information (RFI),
  • Request for Proposal (RFP),
  • Request for Bid (RFB) (or sometimes Request for Price (RFP)),
  • Request for Tender (RFT), and /or
  • Request for Quote (RFQ).

 

We clarify that the RFI / RFP / RFQ are the most common Tendering processes used in the strategic sourcing and procurement cycles, while noting that the RFx process is difficult to define as it can range from a simple one-time RFQ to a complex multi-stage RFI / RFP / RFQ process, depending on the needs of the client. Choosing the most appropriate RFx process, is an important task which depends on the objectives of the sourcing event, the completeness of the product/service requirements, the number of suppliers involved, the level of competition between such suppliers, the inherent risk in the sourcing effort, and projected cost savings or cost avoidance opportunities.

 

A typical Arvo sourcing event will consist of the 3 processes, where;

  1. The RFI is used to collect all stakeholder requirements, determine market interest before pre-qualifying interested and appropriate suppliers,
  2. The RFP is used to gather supplier offers in relation to their products, services, expertise and solutions, before
  3. The RFQ is used for suppliers to finalise their commercials proposals and quotations, leading to a final award decision (while even considering the use of Reverse Auctions at this stage)

 

Undoubtedly numerous benefits exist to regularly and correctly Tender (RFx) such spends but the 2 most important benefits of all sourcing events are to recognise that;

  1. Requests for either information or proposals can provide valuable insight into the current market situation, and
  2. Cost savings or cost avoidance opportunities exist throughout the process.

 

Finally, numerous platforms exist to expedite the Tender (or eTender) process so as to provide assistance with communications, pre-prepared templates, workflow management, access control and analytic tools. When you require assistance with your next Sourcing Challenge, be it a simple one-time RFQ to a complex multi-stage RFI / RFP / RFQ process, contact us to discuss further.

Reduce your Health Insurance Premiums

After our fantastic Commercial Insurance blog post recently (available here), we want to share this insightful Health Insurance advice which will reduce your spend within this category.

 

Thousands of businesses across the country have begun the process of renewing their private health insurance. The market now has over 260 plans with more to come next month. So how to ensure you are getting the best value for your money?

 

When starting to review your cover, it is important to reacquaint yourself with the benefits of your existing policy. Without being aware of the benefits you’re paying for, how can you properly compare and contrast with other options?

 

Start by asking yourself a number of questions, or working through them with a professional broker.

 

Don’t be afraid of waiting periods, find out how they affect you from an independent professional adviser or the Health Insurance Authority; have your healthcare needs changed recently and if so, how; does everyone on the policy require the same level of cover; what level of hospital accommodation is important to you?

 

Health Insurance Savings Advice

  1. Cover for private accommodation in public hospitals, in most cases does not guarantee fast access to treatment. Make sure you have a plan with some access to private hospitals.
  2. Check that hospitals local to you are not excluded and that you are happy with the level of excess applied to accommodation. Some newer plans now have excesses of up to €500 per claim.
  3. Check for shortfalls on specific treatments or procedures such as radiotherapy, chemotherapy, orthopaedic, cardiac and ophthalmic.
  4. Check that you have full cover for day case treatment such as chemotherapy, radiotherapy and colonoscopies in private hospitals – these procedures account for 60 -70% of all health insurance claims.
  5. Try to ensure you have cover for direct settlement MRI and CT scan centres which are local to you. This means you won’t have to wait to get access and you don’t need to pay if they are classified as ‘direct settlement’ centres.
  6. Try to ensure you have cover for major cardiac procedures in the Blackrock Clinic, Mater Private & Beacon Hospitals.
  7. What level of excess applies? Look for a low outpatient excess, this will ensure you get more money back from your outpatient expenses.
  8. If you want cover for day-to-day benefits such as GP, Physiotherapist and dentist ensure that you are getting long term value for money – check the cover for each benefit & how many visits are covered per benefit
  9. Check for any other benefits that may be of interest to you – health screening, maternity benefits, kids benefits etc.
  10. Consider the health insurance needs of all the family individually – consider different plans & levels of cover for each.

 

Feel free to contact us to discuss savings for your Health Insurance (or any other costs which you would like to reduce)

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