Revealed: Government rankings for NHS management consultancies

The document gives scores for each firm that applied to be on a management consultancy framework for health, for both quality and price.

The results show only two firms out of 62 scored more than half on the pricing score.

With 25 out of 100 points available for price, only Deloitte and CPC Project Services scored more than half. Only nine firms scored more than 10 out of 25.

The process was run by the Crown Commercial Service, a government body reporting to the Cabinet Office, late last year. The health services lot was one of seven in the exercise.

NHS bodies are not obliged to use it or any other framework.

Among the other firms ranked were Nesta, Capita and Carnall Farrar.

The process saw 11 of the bidders, which all scored less than 68 out of 100 overall, fail to secure a place on the framework.

These included KPMG, FTI Consulting and Oliver Wyman.

A KPMG spokeswoman said: “We are really proud to be able to support the NHS tackle some of the biggest challenges presented in a generation and in 2017, KPMG’s health practice had one of its most successful years as market leaders in our field. We were pleased to have been appointed to numerous other lots on [the Crown Commercial Service framework] as well as being fully accredited on other public sector frameworks. We work with a number of alliance partners to deliver work, meaning these contracts are just one way that the NHS can access our services.”

FTI and Oliver Wyman did not respond in time for publication.

Procurement frameworks are intended to save the public sector time and resources when looking for a service by offering a set of contractors that have already met quality and finance criteria.

Several other bodies in the fragmented NHS procurement sector offer management consultancy frameworks.

NHS Improvement introduced restrictions on trusts’ use of management consultancies in 2016.

Last year, the head of NHSI’s financial improvement programme Matthew Fox said the regulator would be creating a league table of management consultants.

NHSI last week denied that it had done this but HSJ understands the regulator keeps a list of consultants to avoid hiring. Mr Fox said at the NHS Confederation conference last year that the assessment would get “into the world of Uber and individual scoring”, but with the necessary respect for the individuals involved.

The financial improvement programme involved sending consultancies to trusts that needed help in two waves. A third stage of the programme was cancelled in January.

The Crown Commercial Service framework expires in March 2021.