Supply chain management

New suppliers working for NWL for the first time are required to complete a new supplier assessment form to assess their suitability and competence to undertake business with us in a proper manner as an approved supplier.

The general information requested provides basic details about an organisation, that it has acceptable levels of economic and financial standing eg insurances and that it complies and promotes good practices in areas such as environmental, health and safety and information security performance.

Annually, approved suppliers will be required to provide us with ongoing assurance of their suitability and competence to continue working for us, in particular their health and safety performance.

We use our own standard purchase order terms and conditions of business for goods and/or services contracts and these are detailed below. We do not use a supplier’s terms and conditions so you do not need to refer to them when dealing with NWL.

For works contracts (eg Construction and Civil Engineering) and associated professional service contracts, we use industry standard forms of contract such as the New Engineering Contract (NEC).

NWL complies with all UK legal statutes and regulations that seek to ensure openness, fairness and transparency in its procurement activities. These includes the latest Utilities Contracts Regulations and NWL’s own Financial Approval Rules.

Key legislation that affects us and therefore all suppliers who work with us are the Competition Act, Modern Slavery, Anti Bribery and Corruption, non-Discrimination, Diversity and Equality, GDPR and the Living Wage.

NWL uses electronic e-procurement systems for its procurement and procure to pay processes. These include an e-procurement strategic sourcing platform for tendering purposes currently hosted by Ariba, Oracle i-Procurement and Accounts Payable for Purchase Orders and invoices, including e-invoicing. Suppliers who wish to work for NWL must be electronic procurement capable.

The use of these electronic systems is to provide a simple, secure and efficient means for managing tendering activities that reduces time and effort required for both NWL and suppliers.

We are continually seeking ways to simplify or automate our processes in order to be more efficient.

The Utilities Contracts Regulations 2016 establish a set of rules that govern how certain value contracts above stated thresholds must be advertised and awarded by NWL.

To advertise our requirements, we use either the Achilles vendor database (UVDB) or an OJEU Contract Notice:-

• The Achilles Utilities Vendor Database (UVDB) is the utility industry standard pre-qualification system used by procurement organisations such as NWL to help identify potential suppliers for their needs. Suppliers are encouraged to register their company details on the UVDB to receive notification of tenders that are in their area of interest and to ensure that their UVDB information is correct and up to date. 

You can find out more about the services offered by Achilles here.

• Alternatively, we also issue Contract Notices (or Adverts) which are advertisements placed in the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) that provide a gateway for suppliers who wish to search for new business opportunities. When responding to a Notice, Suppliers are given access our e-procurement tendering portal that contains all tender documentation which ensures any potential supplier knows all of our requirements up front.