Support and Further Development of Existing Bespoke Customer Data Applications

Description

Summary of the work 1) Reactive support for our live bespoke product 2) One five-day sprint per month (2FTE resources), to work on small incremental developments to the live product, from our Product Backlog; and 3) Option to purchase additional blocks of days for more complex development requirements. Latest start date Saturday 3 April 2021 Why the Work is Being Done Current supplier is no longer able to provide the service. We require Support and Further Development of Existing Bespoke Customer Data Applications (an internal website application and sql server database; windows app; pwa app; and integration with our income management system) The main technologies used are • .NET MVC using razor pages • Microsoft C# • jQuery and JavaScript • PWA Web • UWP (C#) for App The backend code currently communicates with the SQL database via fluent nHibernate. Problem to Be Solved 1. Remote support as and when needed, M-F 9am-6pm. Avg 2 issues per week. High priority = fix within 8 hours Medium priority = up to 72-hour fix Low priority = Out of scope – see 2. below 2. Monthly incremental development (currently we have one 5-day sprint once a month with two FTE resources). 3. Option to Purchase Additional Development Days for more complex changes compared to number 2 as opportunities arise (Please provide day rate and any discounts based on purchasing larger blocks of time) Who Are the Users The end users are predominantly our own staff who need to enter / amend data so that records are create or updated and so that appropriate automated processes are run. Work Already Done Database, front end website, Windows app and web-based app have already been developed, along with integration to our income management system (BlueBox from Trace). These are live now. Existing Team You will be working predominantly with one Product Owner plus some contact if needed with ExtraCare's IT team and Managed Service Provider Current Phase Live Skills & Experience • .NET MVC including razor pages • Microsoft C# • jQuery and JavaScript • Progressive Web Applications • UWP (C#) for App • SQL Server • Experience of maintaining a bespoke product Nice to Haves • nHibernate • Create additional complex reports in SSRS Report Builder if required • Manage support tickets, and respond / work on our Product Backlog using Trello Work Location Remotely Working Arrangments 1. Remote support as and when needed, M-F 9am-6pm. Avg 2 issues per week. High priority = fix within 8 hours Medium priority = up to 72-hour fix Low priority = Out of scope – see 2. below 2. Monthly incremental development (currently we have one 5-day sprint once a month with two FTE resources). 3. Option to Purchase Additional Development Days for more complex changes compared to number 2 as opportunities arise (Please provide day rate and any discounts based on purchasing larger blocks of time) Security Clearance Not beyond a Non Disclosure Agreement and Data Processing Agreement Additional T&Cs ExtraCare Terms and Conditions to be provided upon award. No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 5 Proposal Criteria • Approach and methodology • Value for money • How your approach to understanding our bespoke product, will ensure you can support and further develop it • How your approach meets our three requirements as stated Cultural Fit Criteria • Be transparent and collaborative when making decisions • Have a no-blame culture and encourage people to learn from their mistakes • Work as a team with our organisation and other suppliers Payment Approach Time and materials Assessment Method • Case study • Work history • Reference • Presentation Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 55% Cultural fit 10% Price 35% Questions from Suppliers 1. Is there an incumbent supplier please? Yes. Supplier is changing their business model due to Covid. They will work with the new provider to assist with handover. 2. What is the budget assigned to this opportunity please? We recommend that you provide a quote for providing:1. Remote support as and when needed, M-F 9am-6pm. Avg 2 issues per week.2. Monthly incremental development (based on 5 day sprint per month with 2 FTE resources) And for 3, provide a day rate, along any discounts available for purchasing larger blocks of days (such as 20, 40 and 80). 3. How best would you like us to respond to the 7 Essential skills/experiences as the tech asks don’t align directly to your 3 problems to be solved? Should we evidence the tech as asked OR the problems to solve:1. Remote support as and when needed, M-F 9am-6pm. Avg 2 issues per week.2. Monthly incremental development.3. Option to Purchase Additional Development Days for more complex changes (Please provide day rate and any discounts based on purchasing larger blocks of time) We recommend that you explain how you would approach the three problems and if possible, examples of doing so for other organisations.Then evidence your skills and experience of each of the first 6 tech requirements, as all 3 problems require these. 4. How many applications are in scope for support?Are they currently on-premise internally, hosted by a third party or cloud based? All applications push and pull data from an SQL database.The main application is a website.The website runs through IIS.The SQL database and website are hosted on ExtraCare servers which are private cloud hosted by a third party.There is an app for ‘resilience assessments’ built using PWA web technologies and a Windows app which has three other types of wellbeing assessment. There is an online volunteer application form which is exposed externally which integrates into the main application.The backend communicates with a 3rd party income management system via a staging database (on the same private cloud). 5. How many case studies/clients can we evidence in response to each essential skills and nice-to-have question? Assuming that case studies will cover a number of these areas, we suggest max 5 in total. 6. What does the incumbent use in terms of source control? We use Bitbucket as a cloud repository. 7. How does the incumbent deploy changes to the live environment? From the developer: "For live pushes I use our Citrix log in to manually overwrite the staging site on Server CP-01. Once this has got the go ahead I run a batch file which copies across the staging to the live site. This file also produces backups of the existing site for rollbacks if necessary, which there is also a batch file for". 8. Is there a current test environment and does it reside under the control of the incumbent? ExtraCare have test server within the private cloud for user acceptance testing, but the incumbent provides the development environment. 9. How are support requests handled? Users report issues to ExtraCare's support desk and/or Product Owner. We currently raise issues with the incumbent, and track issues to completion using a Trello board. There may occasionally be advantage to the supplier contacting users directly when resolving a live issue. 10. Are there any monitoring tools used on the application? The database is monitored via a different third party. No other monitoring currently takes place. 11. Has the system been fully documented, can an example of this be made available? Not fully documented. We do have process maps and validation tables which informed the incumbent on the requirements for integration with the income management system. An example process flow and validation table has been published here https://extracareuk-my.sharepoint.com/:f:/g/personal/dave_bosworth_extracare_org_uk/ElmdqhXbfEFLqNTlNr_ST2YB8nIvxVZqAbPGevuz0IY5MQ?e=HYPlSl 12. Can a sample of the code be made available so a judgement can be made with regards it’s quality in terms of readability, notations, etc? A code snippet of the call which pushes the data from our care process to our local and bluebox staging databases, is available here https://extracareuk-my.sharepoint.com/:f:/g/personal/dave_bosworth_extracare_org_uk/ElmdqhXbfEFLqNTlNr_ST2YB8nIvxVZqAbPGevuz0IY5MQ?e=HYPlSl 13. What are the main type of support issues being raised? Current issues requiring support average just 2 issues a week. These are almost always Medium Priority issues, being small glitches in the data which are preventing processes from working correctly. Low priority issues currently get dealt with during the monthly sprint.