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Dec 2020
Visit Harrogate website contract awarded without tender
Harrogate Borough Council has awarded a contract without competitive tender to a company from Ipswich to rebuild its tourism website.
The council approved the move on Thursday, saying covid had created an "economic crisis" that necessitated bypassing its usual procurement rules.
The meeting was not open to the public but a report prepared in advance for councillors recommended hiring the Jacob Bailey Group for four years to redevelop the Visit Harrogate site.
The report said it would take six months to undertake a "full procurement process" and the site needed to be ready in time for the 2021 tourist season. It adds:
The document says there were just two main companies providing services in this field and "market research" had identified the Jacob Bailey Group.
Recently the authority was criticised by a local businessman for awarding a contract to project manage its investment in leisure services to a firm in Somerset - again without going through a tendering process.
Read more:
- Harrogate council increases search delays to seven weeks
- Somerset company chosen to develop £26 million Harrogate leisure projects
HBC said the current Visit Harrogate site, which the council acquired in 2020, had suffered from "historic underinvestment" and "visually no longer meets the user requirements or expectations".
According to the report, the site receives over 800,000 hits a year. It adds:
The Stray Ferret asked the council the value of the contract, why it had not dealt with the matter sooner, what market research had led it to select the Jacob Bailey Group and whether it felt any local firms were capable of providing the service.
A council spokesman replied with the following statement:
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