Gauteng Finance MEC Ms Barbara Creecy today announced that her department is searching for a new bank to manage the multibillion rand centralised banking services account of the province.
The current contract with the Gauteng Provincial Government held by FNB is coming to an end in 2016. This is the fifth time that the province goes out to the market with the view to procure this type of banking services. The tender closes on 6 February 2015 and will be awarded for a five year period.
The province’s budget is estimated at more than R90 billion in 2015 and the winning bank would need to manage all the banking transactions including the payment of salaries of 200 000 officials and supplier payments of about R3-billion rand per month.
The winning bank should demonstrate competence to meet the complex corporate and commercial banking requirements of GPG. These include, among other things:
- Complete centralised GPG portfolio consisting of about 232 bank accounts, about 151 petty cash books, eight trading accounts;
- Ability to handle very large transaction volumes, consisting of nearly R3 billion salaries per month end;
- Efficient and cost effective current accounts administration;
- Ongoing electronic banking and systems training to support GPG officials in the effective management of such systems;
- Internal Controls that will prevent and detect any fraud to GPG;
- Appropriate skills training and development of GPG officials in all spheres of financial services as required by the GPG at no cost to the GPG;
- Processes to identify and deal with uncleared/unidentified transactions reflected in both the Exchequer and Pay Master General Accounts to minimise the accumulation of un-cleared items;
MEC Creecy said government will build a sustainable relationship with the winning bidder in order to realise its broader objectives of radical transformation, modernisation and reindustrialisation.
“Our aim is to utilise the relationship we have with the winning institution to invest in the township economy by availing financial as well as non-financial assistance to small business owners. The successful bidder will also work with us to increase the financial literacy of our employees and invest in community programmes to improve the living conditions of our people,” MEC Creecy said.
The banking tender is also part of the Open Tender Pilot project but is different to other tenders that are issued by government. This is because according to the provisions made by the National Treasury there are only four major banks that have been approved as clearing banks for the purposes of opening bank accounts with the provincial governments. Therefore, only those banks are eligible to submit their bids for this tender.
On the closing date, the department will publicly open the box and imprint the submitted tenders. They will be evaluated by the Bid Evaluation Committee who will make a recommendation to the Bid Adjudication Committee whose deliberations will be open to the public.
It is anticipated that the tender will be awarded by mid-year to allow the Gauteng Provincial Treasury a twelve-month transition and implementation by the successful bidder on the 1st April 2016.
For more information, please contact:
John Sukazi
Cell: 0837724885
