"I'm delighted that Buying Solutions' Zanzibar eMarketplace has been used to provide the platform for NHS eTrade. This demonstrates the benefits of true collaboration and is a real example of joined up working. The functionality and core content of Zanzibar can now be used wisely to avoid the unnecessary duplication, wastage of public sector funds in incurring higher start up costs and the longer time that would have been needed for development and testing of a completely new system."

Robert Knapman, Head of eCommerce,
OGCbuying.solutions

"I view NHS eTrade as being the total collaborative solution for the NHS having significant back-end integration for NHS trusts and suppliers, not just the large suppliers but all suppliers both large and smallest. This is particularly significant to trusts that all have a significant ‘tail' of suppliers who account for significant transaction volumes. Using the NHS eTrade service will enable every company to become eEnabled very quickly and for trusts to have access to supplier managed catalogues; a very significant benefit by implementing the service."

Mansel Chamberlain,
Advisor to the NHS and former Procurement Director, NW London Procurement Confederation

"The most impressive part of working with ProcServe is the individual staff. They are fantastic to work with, very capable and extremely committed. They are also really enthusiastic and if you speak to our customers you will hear exactly the same."

Robert Knapman, Director of eCommerce,
OGCbuying.solutions

"Zanzibar is saving time of our staff members and it's saving us money. It is making our procurement processes slicker and more efficient and it means that we can get real services for our front-line staff to help customers quicker and more efficiently. There is no better way of doing things."

David Smith, Commercial Director,
Department for Work and Pensions (DWP)

"We are delighted that ProcServe and OGCbuying.solutions won in this category [MCA Award - Operational Performance]. The team have worked hard to deliver this groundbreaking service, so this is a fantastic accolade to have been awarded for all the hard work."

Robert Knapman, Director of eCommerce,
OGCbuying.solutions

The Review commended DWP on having 'strong performance management, and a potentially world-class purchase to pay platform, with Oracle and Zanzibar'.

Department for Work and Pensions,
OGC Procurement Capability Review 2008

"We at the Department for Children, Schools and Families feel that [OPEN] will offer real choice and collaborative buying potential to schools."

Former Deputy Commercial Director & Head of Educational Procurement Centre,
Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF)

"OPEN reflects e-Spi's vision to achieve a vibrant and robust school marketplace which supports the efficient and effective measurement of school resources."

Sue Hall,
e-Spi (Electronic Schools Purchasing Information)

"OPEN is really easy to use. I have more choices available as I have access to a different range of suppliers. I managed to save 30% on an identical item by comparing prices on OPEN, the delivery and service from the supplier was excellent as well. I would not have achieved this saving by looking through catalogues which can be time consuming. For schools on tight budgets, this could make a real difference."

Avis Bourdon, Business Manager,
Motcombe Community School

"The level of friendliness on the ProcServe helpdesk is too rare of Helpdesk support these days."

Verity Quinton, National Account Manager,
Office Angels (Zanzibar Supplier)

"I like it a lot, I think it is very good.  I use other systems and OPEN is by far the best. The electronic purchase order, eInvoicing and catalogue system is brilliant and is very easy to use" 

Erik Morley, IT Manager,
Wightman & Parrish (OPEN Supplier)

"By removing the tedious, manual stages of procurement and making them electronic, Zanzibar allows public sector employees to focus on more the valuable, enriching aspects of their jobs."

Denis Kelliher, Associate Director of Purchasing,
Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust

"Zanzibar has tremendous environmental benefits. It allows buyers and suppliers to avoid consuming paper, creating paper waste, generating emissions from paper delivery. It cuts data entry errors which often consume additional paper and other resources as buyers and suppliers try to reconcile discrepancies."

Steve Darbyshire, Head of Procurment,
DCLG

"St. Mary's demonstrates that trading electronically with suppliers on the Zanzibar Managed Service can bring huge benefits in terms of saving time and money in the procurement process. St Mary's experience shows that the transition to Zanzibar can be achieved quickly with little disruption to the organisation."

Hugh Barrett, former Chief Executive,
OGCbuying.Solutions

"ProcServe worked closely with OGC and OGCbuying.solutions to make the Zanzibar specification into a reality. They marshalled the skills and capabilities of key people to resolve the challenges of 'joining up' government organisations in many sectors in a way that has never been done before. In particular they respected each prospective user organisation's uniqueness, regardless of whether they were a buyer or a supplier."

Robert Knapman, Director of eCommerce,
OGCBuying.Solutions

"Teign school and the primary schools in our learning community are very excited about being a pathfinder for OPEN and supporting this DCSF initiative. We expect to improve our procurement process with all our suppliers through this innovative eProcurement initiative. OPEN will also help us and other schools across the country to achieve better value, by widening choice and allowing for more informed purchasing decisions. We are looking forward to using OPEN as a platform to support collaboration with other schools in Devon and organisations across the wider UK public sector."

Vyv Game, Head Teacher,
Teign School

"We have great hopes for Zanzibar in the future because it will provide a platform to enable us to buy from more suppliers, reduce our costs from doing day to day purchasing and be much more efficient."

David Waterson, Head of Procurement,
DCLG

"We are now revising our supplier adoption strategy purely on a commodity basis and looking at commodities where there are lots of purchase order transactions and to bring them into Zanzibar."

Paul Newman, Zanzibar Project Manager,
DCLG

"The beauty of going into Zanzibar is that we do not need to maintain any of the catalogues as they are maintained elsewhere which is a considerable saving in efficiencies."

David Waterson, Head of Procurement,
DCLG

"We are looking to remove paper, the duplicate keying, the redundant processes from our purchase-to-pay processes, and to make it fully electronic. Zanzibar helps us achieve this aim."

Steve Derbyshire, Head of Procurement,
DCLG

"The Communities decided to implement Zanzibar because it was seen by us as a mechanism for improving the efficiencies of purchasing low value items."

David Waterson, Head of Procurement,
DCLG

"We are seeing a big change in the procurement process now. We are getting far better value for money from our purchases and orders are processed much faster and more effectively with the roll-out of Zanzibar across St Mary's."

Keith Murray, Deputy Director of Facilities,
Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust

"We chose Zanzibar for two specific reasons. One for the flexibility it provides the supplier in how they transact with us and receive orders. The second reason was that Zanzibar is one of the only systems on the market where the supplier does not have to pay per transaction. As Zanzibar is a web-based system and ordering is simply done at a 'click' of a button, we have seen more time given back to the clinician and the medical staff which will be allocated back to the patient. Ultimately NHS Trusts are here to serve the patient and they should only be spending a fraction of their time ordering goods and services."

Denis Kelliher, Associate Director of Purchasing,
Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust

"What we lack in the health service is information about what we buy. Zanzibar provides us with essential management information about our purchases with a detailed granularity that just wasn't available before. Zanzibar will ensure a great reduction in errors in the end-to-end procurement process, which in turn will mean that Invoice discrepancies will be far reduced. Ultimately this will mean the whole administration time taken for ordering goods & services will be greatly minimised."

Mansel Chamberlain,
Advisor to the NHS and former Procurement Director, NW London Procurement Confederation