Problem with website delays Nama search for insolvency team

The National Asset Management Agency (Nama) has been forced to delay the procurement of a high-level team of insolvency experts because of problems with the new eTenders website.

Nama said yesterday the tender deadline for appointments to its insolvency practitioners’ panels, which will aid its foreclosure work in Ireland and the UK, had been extended until November 21st to make up for the disruption caused by the site’s relaunch.

Nama is just one of a number of State agencies understood to have been affected by technical problems with the newly designed procurement portal, etenders.gov.ie

The revamped site, launched by Minister for Procurement Brian Hayes last Monday, was intended to simplify the tendering process for SMEs and reduce the cumbersome paper trail. However, from the outset users have reported problems.

The National Procurement Service (NPS), which has overall responsibility for the site, said yesterday it had received assurances from its service provider that the access issues had now been resolved. However, it acknowledged that problems regarding the failure of suppliers to receive email notices of upcoming tenders still remained and would not be fully resolved until at least next week.

“The NPS has requested its service provider, as a matter of urgency, to provide specific guidance to all suppliers on how to update their profile to ensure they get alerts on new tenders within their area.”

To manage the load on the system, however, the NPS said this guidance would be issued on a phased basis up to and including next Monday.

The contract to build the new site was outsourced by the NPS to Swedish company EU Supply after no Irish companies bid for the tender.

The former service provider Millstream, which operated the site when it was under the aegis of the Department of Finance, yesterday launched a mytenders.iewebsite in an apparent bid to capitalise on its successor's problems.