Bidders get extra three weeks to send in documents

The City of London has extended the deadline for its new architecture framework because of the covid-19 pandemic.

The process to appoint architects to the £34m, four-year deal originally started last month and was due to close for expressions of interest last week.

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The City's £34m deal will run for four years

But in a notice for changes on the Official Journal, the corporation said firms now have a three-week extension, giving them until 11 August to submit their selection questionnaires (SQ).

It said: "This [extension] is in order for amendments to be made to some SQ and ITT [invitation to tender] questions and the specification and for bidders to have time to prepare and respond to these changes.

"The amendments have been deemed necessary due to the changing economic landscape brought about by covid-19, the differential impacts the pandemic is having and the City Corporation’s strengthened commitment to eroding barriers to contracting with SMEs and to actively addressing under-representation within our supply chains as part of our public sector equality duty."

The framework consists of four lots broken down by value and project type.

Lot one is for the provision of architectural services for projects with a construction value up to £6m with a fee value between £100,000 and £325,000.

The second lot is for architectural services on projects with a construction value of more than £6m with a fee value between £326,000 and £1.5m.

Lot three is for architectural services for interior fit-out type projects, while lot four covers architectural services for historic and conservation projects.

A practice can be awarded a place on a maximum of two lots.