Prestige Network scores a real coup to provide language services across the North of England

July 23, 2010 - PRLog -- Thatcham-based language company Prestige Network has scored a real coup in language services provision within the public sector, with the announcement that it is the only language company to have succeeded in getting onto framework agreements for all of the core language services, for the public sector in both the North West and North East of England.

It means that the company is unique in terms of delivery capability of language services throughout the North of England.

Prestige Network learnt recently that it had successfully tendered to be on the framework agreement to provide Interpreting and Translation services for more than 10 NHS trusts/PCTs and three police forces within the Commercial Support Unit North East.

It was already on the framework agreement for Face to Face Interpreting, Telephone Interpreting, Translation and British Sign Languages for more than 50 NHS trusts and five police forces, within the North West Collaborative Commercial Agency.

Shawn Khorassani, Prestige Network’s Strategy and Business Development Director, said: “It was good news to find that we had successfully tendered to be on the Commercial Support Unit North East framework agreement, as we were already on the framework agreement for the North West.  

“This means that we are the only language company to be on both framework agreements for all of the core activities within the agreements, so we are unique for language services delivery in the North of England. Then we learnt the real icing on the cake – which was that the North West Collaborative Commercial Agency had decided to extend its current framework agreement for two years from 31 October 2010 to 31 October 2012.

“Both of these framework agreements could be huge for us: for example, the North West Collaborative Commercial Agency (NWCCA) - comprising more than 50 NHS trusts and five police forces – has a combined estimated potential of up to £5m pounds a year. If a company is not lucky enough to be in the framework agreement, then it doesn’t stand a chance of getting that work – basically you’ve got to be in it to win it!”

The NWCCA is essentially an NHS organisation, established by the NHS, for the NHS and drives improved procurement and commercial efficiencies across the North West health economy. Over the past five years, the NWCCA has helped Trusts achieve savings of more than £110 million, which has been reinvested to further enhance the quality of patient care. A unique aspect of this framework agreement is the involvement of Greater Manchester police, as well as four other North West forces: Merseyside, Lancashire, Cheshire and Cumbria.

The NWCCA framework agreement means that end users - for example NHS Trusts – can just refer to a NWCCA marketing flyer when they want to use a language company, such as Prestige Network. The flyer highlights to end users why there is no need for them to repeat the procurement process and tells them that “each supplier has been evaluated as able to provide the quality of interpretation and translation services required by NHS Trusts”.

The Commercial Support Unit North East is a new organisation (Spring 2010) developed to address the ambitions and objectives of the local health economy in becoming more commercially effective. The framework agreement is designed to allow end users to approach a wider range of language providers than currently, companies that have been evaluated against “robust pre-qualification questionnaire and scoring criteria”.

Shawn said: “Ultimately, social cohesion is what Britain today is striving for. It’s important to remember that specialist language services such as us work in a positive way to meet the requirements of today’s multicultural society.

“We feel privileged to be in a position to be able to provide language services to the public sector throughout the North of England – all aspects of translating and interpreting are valuable tools in helping social cohesion to take place.”

More details about Prestige Network are on http://www.prestigenetwork.com or 01635 866888.

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Prestige Network provides managed language services in ALL languages to public and commercial sector. Any time, anywhere, any language.