Perth & Kinross Contract Monitoring Process

PERTH & KINROSS CONTRACT MONITORING PROCESS

(extracted from the HCC Commissioning & Contracting Team Guidance)

Contract Monitoring and Reviewing

7.1 Background

7.1.1The Commissioning and Contracting Team is responsible for monitoring a range of different contracts for care, housing support and other services purchased by the Housing & Community Care Service as well as offering advice and support on relevant commissioning and contracting matters where required. The following contract types are currently in place and require to be monitored:

–Service Level Agreements

–Housing Support Contracts

–Community Care Block Contracts

–National Care Home Contracts

–Care at Home Contracts

–Individual letters of agreement

7.1.2It is stressed at the outset that the monitoring approach is adaptable and flexible enough to deal with the variety of services types which are in place, and this is a recurring theme within this guidance. It should also be noted that some Service Level Agreements have complex funding packages and this leads to various reporting arrangements

7.1.3This Guidance is a preface to the Contract Monitoring Toolkit and aims to provide general instruction to officers on how the toolkit is applied. The toolkit itself covers key areas/themes, methods and approaches.

7.1.4The Guidance is also consistent with the Council’s overall approach to ensuring that it effectively scrutinises the use of public funds encompassed in the Following the Public Pound Guidance.

7.2 Key Principles of the Monitoring Approach

Contract Monitoring has been defined as a stand-alone exercise separate from that undertaken by other regulatory agencies, focused on checking, controlling and recording whether services are being provided within the terms of contract and service specification.

The following key principles will apply to our activity:

The service quality of care and support as well as the safety of the service user for whom the service has been commissioned is paramount.
Services must provide evidence of value for money.
Services must be in line with the Council’s strategic objectives.
7.3 How we will undertake Monitoring

The monitoring activities undertaken by the Commissioning and Contracting Team will seek to apply the principle of proportionality. From the Council’s perspective, this applies a risk based approach, which is designed to ensure that more attention is focused onto services which require some improvement, or indeed where there are some weaknesses or there is under-performance. In turn, this ensures that the time resources of the team are used effectively. For providers we will also try to ensure that contract monitoring is not an excessively bureaucratic burden which detracts from their primary focus on service delivery. The Commissioning and Contracting Team must always be aware that it is key role is to monitor and scrutinise, but these duties are delivered in a fashion which should be supportive to providers.

Three key documents provide a framework for Monitoring Officers to undertake monitoring activities, as follows:

Contract Monitoring Process
Pre-Monitoring Template
Risk Assessment Matrix

This framework offers approaches and methods which can be used by Monitoring Officers to ensure that monitoring at individual service level is targeted at areas which require scrutiny or attention. Across the range of services which are monitored by the team the framework should be used flexibly by officers to prioritise the services which require greater attention, and areas of potential weakness where monitoring should be directed.

An annual risk assessment using the above Matrix will be carried out for each service drawing information from a variety of sources including:

Previous monitoring or review reports
Care Commission Reports and Gradings issued to services (where applicable)
PQASSO ratings or other Quality Assurance Systems operated by the provider
Feedback from key stakeholders such as operational social work staff or housing staff; health staff and finance or policy colleagues.

These Risk Assessments will be discussed and approved by the Monitoring Officer’s line manager, and this will enable each officer to develop a programme for monitoring their allocated services. In addition, when undertaking monitoring visits, monitoring officers will use the risk assessment to identify areas of the provider’s operation which are to be scrutinised.

Providers will also be required to provide a range of information to the Housing and Community Care, and this will be specified in the contract or service specification, and will be consistent with the overall approach outlined in this section. This will include:

Performance reports on outcomes and activity outlined in the service specification.
Financial reporting

-An end of year finance report for service activities in Perth & Kinross including an Income and Expenditure Statement and Balance Sheet.

-Annual Audited Accounts fro the business/organisation.

-Half Year Management and Budget forecasts on request.

Quality System reports based on the PQASSO Quality System or an equivalent quality system approach used by the organisation.
Complaints.
Reports by other monitoring agencies – e.g. the Care Commission.
Policies and Procedure Schedules.

–Updates on policies and procedures in place or updated.

Annual Project Report if appropriate.
Committee agendas, reports and minutes if appropriate.

7.4Reporting Styles/Formats

Monitoring officers are required to compile 3 different types of report depending on the scope and intensity of the monitoring carried out. The 3 options are 1) an annual summary report 2) a standard monitoring report or 3) a review report. Templates are available for monitoring officers to use for these different types of monitoring report.

Annual Summary Report

In situations where services are designated low risk, information will be requested from the provider on service activity and from other areas, in order to formulate an annual summary report covering one annual period.

Standard Monitoring Report

Where more in depth monitoring has been undertaken based on medium level of risk and a scheduled visit is undertaken and specific areas are being examined, then the monitoring officer will compile Monitoring Report following the exercise.

Full Review Report

In certain situations a full blown review of service will undertaken leading to a Review Report. This may be relevant in the following circumstances:

when a service is approaching the end of a contract term
when there is a strategic review of a market area
when there are budget changes which require priorities to be established
where service decommissioning is being considered
where a service has been in place for a long period and a fresh look is required.

The Commissioning and Contracting team will work in conjunction with the Finance team to scrutinise finance information from providers, giving consideration to financial viability and value for money.

Table 1, (attached to this Guide) is extracted from the Following the Public Pound (FtPP) Guidance and indicates the Reporting Procedures for external bodies for different levels of funding and is attached for reference. It should be noted that the monitoring approach outlined in this section of this Guide should be read in conjunction with the FtPP guidance, and should be consistent with it.

7.5 Aims and Objectives of Monitoring

The following are our aims of contract monitoring:

To ensure that services are delivered in accordance with the service specified in the terms of the contract.
To ensure that services are delivered to service users to meet their assessed needs and which afford them every protection from abuse or threat of abuse.
To ensure that services are delivered at the price specified in the contract.
To ensure that service providers evidence the required quality of their performance under the contract.
To involve all relevant stakeholders in the contract monitoring process as appropriate.
To work with providers in order to improve service quality and performance.
To inform future service planning and commissioning activity.

7.6 Accountability

The Purchased Services Board

For all services purchased for the Housing Community Care Service the Purchased Services Board is remitted to receive reports and make decisions about contracts within Housing Community Care. The remit includes:

Oversee review programmes.
Oversee the monitoring activities of the Commissioning and Contracts Team
Make decisions about future purchasing intentions
Oversee the development of a Commissioning Strategy
Ensure compliance with Following the Public Pound

On certain issues the Purchased Services Board will refer to the Housing Community Care SMT and in particular situations to the Housing & Health Committee. It will be the responsibility of those representatives of the Purchased Services Board to feed back to relevant staff within the area of the service they are representing at the Purchased Services Board. It will be the responsibility of the Team Leader Commissioning and Contracting to ensure decisions made at the Purchased Services Board are enacted and team members are advised.

Organisations seeking new (or increased) funding should only now apply to the service via the Purchased Services Board route. It will be the responsibility of whichever officer in the service receiving the application to ensure it is re-routed to the Purchased Services Board. Voluntary organisations can also apply for funding from the Council’s Financial Assistance Panel (FAP) and applications through that route will be evaluated by Housing & Community Care when the organisation concerned is delivering a service which meets Housing Community Care strategic objectives and dependent on the amount of funding awarded, monitoring arrangements will need to be established within the service,

If funding is awarded through other commissioning routes such as Mental Health Level 1; Carer’s Strategy funding or Choose Life funding for example, then a transparent process must be evident before any decision regarding the award of funding is made. Subsequent contractual arrangements, monitoring and reporting arrangements will be required for these.

Scrutiny under Following the Public Pound Guidance

The monitoring activities within Housing & Community Care are also subject to the scrutiny under the Following the Public Pound (FPP) Guidance. The Commissioning and Contracting Team will work with the Complaints and Governance Officer to ensure that monitoring systems comply in full with the Code.

In summary the Code of Guidance on FPP sets out the Council’s rules and procedures for ensuring openness, transparency and the public accountability of Council funds transferred to companies, trusts and other arms length bodies to deliver Council services to the local community. As such the monitoring activities within Housing & Community Care must comply with this code. The summary of the Code of Guidance on FPP will be added when finalised.

A central register of externally funded organisations which must comply with the Code is maintained and includes those voluntary organisations that have received either funding corporately (through the Financial Assistance Panel for example) or from individual services (our Service Level Agreements for example). This central register is maintained within the service jointly by the Commissioning and Contracting Team and the Budgets Section.

Housing &Health Committee

A report will be submitted, on an annual basis, to the Housing & Health Committee detailing contract and service level agreement funding for the financial year, and with information summarising the monitoring and commissioning activities carried out by the Housing & Community Care Commissioning & Contracting Team in the previous period.

7.7 Reporting Requirements and Process

Reporting on monitoring activity is a critical part of the governance arrangements for all services which are purchased by the Council. All reports are public documents which should be of a quality and robustness to stand up to scrutiny. A draft monitoring report should be completed in the first instance and will be shared with the provider, the relevant monitoring officer’s line manager and the operational service manager concerned for that area of the service with an agreed period of two weeks for comment. The final version of the report will be concluded at the end of that two week period and will then be published on the Team Intranet (Sharepoint) Site with access to relevant Service Managers and Senior Management representatives as well as the provider. This is detailed in full in the Table below with slight variances noted for each type of contractual arrangement

The following table indicates the range of different types of report which will be prepared by the Commissioning and Contracting Team, and the Committees/Groups to which reports will be submitted. Different management and scrutiny arrangements mean that there is duality of reporting and it is necessary to streamline reporting activities as much as possible, by using the standard reporting template/s within the toolkit for different audiences and timing meetings within a coherent cycle that fits with the monitoring programme. The Purchased Services Board will meet throughout the year, but meetings in February/March and September /October will be critical for the annual cycle of contract award and budget setting.

Reporting Requirements

By type of service / Type and Frequency / Reporting Requirements and Process
Care Homes / Individual Monitoring Report once a year (or more depending on risk assessment) / (a)Draft report shared with provider, line manager and relevant Service Managers
(b)Final report added to Sharepoint Site with copy to Head of Community Care
(c)Summary report for period prepared for Care Home Liaison Group (anonymised)
(d)Summary Report or Reports “by exception” to Purchased Services Board 6 monthly.
(e)Reports also tabled at Care Home Review Group
Care at Home Providers / Individual Monitoring Report once a year / (a)Draft report shared with provider, line manager and relevant Service Managers
(b)Final report added to Sharepoint Site with copy to Head of Community Care
(c)Summary Report or Reports “by exception” to Purchased Services Board 6 monthly.
SLAs / Individual Monitoring Report once a year. / (a)A summary report or reports “by exception” to the Purchased Services Board annually or more frequently determined by the assessed level of risk.
(b)An annual report for organisations receiving in excess of £15,000 per annum from the Financial Assistance Panel will be required for that group each February.
(c)A summary report to other funding groups (such as Carer Strategy or Mental Health Level 1) will be required for the period covered.
Block Contracts / Individual Monitoring Report once a year / (a)Draft report shared with provider; line manager and relevant Service Managers
(b)Final report added to Sharepoint Site with copy to Head of Community Care
(c) A summary report or reports “by exception” to the Purchased Services Board annually or more
frequently determined by the assessed level of risk.
Housing Support / Individual Monitoring Report once a year / (a)Draft report shared with provider; line manager and relevant Service Manager
(b)Final report added to Sharepoint Site with copy to Head of Community Care
(c) A summary report or reports “by exception” to the Purchased Services Board annually or more
frequently determined by the assessed level of risk.

Full Reviews shall be undertaken as set out in sections 7.3 and 7.8.

*SharePoint Site is also accessible to relevant operational service managers and to the Service Manager Planning and Commissioning and all reports are also shared with service providers.