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The public deadline is 4 September 2026, 12:00 BST. From the memo date that was two working days. From 2 September 2026 it is past or imminent. This page is a dated worked example of a No-go, not an invitation to bid and not “open now”.

1. Verdict in 8 lines

1. The notice is unusually detailed for Contracts Finder. The work is real, specified, and SME-flagged (API).
2. Clock is the killer. Published 11 August 2026; deadline 4 September 2026, 12:00 BST (API). 827 views. If you are not already in the pack, you cannot honestly survey, design, price temporary generation and write an Isolation Impact Assessment by Friday noon.
3. This is works, not a term service. There is no published incumbent for board SP-3-3-21.
4. The Trust does award similar-scale electrical packages to named contractors (section 4). That is pattern, not a named winner of this board.
5. Pass/fail insurance, turnover and NICEIC/NAPIT numbers are Unknown on CF.
6. Flip to Qualify only if you are already mid-bid (section 6).

2. What this contract actually is (plain English)

Epsom and St Helier University Hospitals NHS Trust wants a suitably qualified and experienced electrical contractor to design and replace existing electrical distribution board SP-3-3-21 in the A Block Lower Basement Plant Room at St Helier Hospital (API description).

This is not a “send two electricians and swap a board” job. The public description is a mini-specification. It includes, in the buyer’s own words (paraphrased only where HTML entities need decoding; the source is the notice):

• Detailed surveys, investigations, circuit tracing and verification of the existing installation.
• Load monitoring and confirmation of existing and proposed demand.
• Detailed electrical design, calculations and coordination with the existing hospital electrical infrastructure.
• Discrimination and protection coordination studies.
• Supply and installation of a new Form 4 compartmentalised panel board, nominally rated at 250A, subject to contractor design verification.
• A new outgoing protective device from PB-2-1 and associated modifications.
• About 50 metres of 120mm² 4-core XLPE/SWA/LSF submain cable, subject to final design and site verification.
• A separate CPC, subject to final design calculations.
• New cable containment, supports and brackets where required.
• CT metering enclosure and associated metering.
• Cable termination chambers.
• Identification, isolation, disconnection, transfer, reconnection and testing of all retained outgoing circuits from SP-3-3-21.
• Removal and lawful disposal of the existing board and redundant kit.
• Earthing and bonding modifications.
• Builder’s work, fire stopping and making good.
• Full inspection, testing, commissioning, operational proving and certification.
• Thermographic inspection after energisation.
• Record drawings, O&M, asset information, training and handover.

All of the above is on the Contracts Finder description dated 11 August 2026 (API).

The environment that makes it hard

The works are “within a live operational acute hospital environment”. Continuity of electrical supplies and shutdown risk are called out as particular importance. The contractor must produce a comprehensive Isolation Impact Assessment and detailed switching, shutdown, temporary-supply, contingency and rollback arrangements with the Trust’s Authorised Person (Electrical), estates, and affected clinical/service stakeholders (API).

Tenderers must include for all temporary electrical supplies needed to keep critical and operational services running — the notice lists temporary distribution boards, cabling, generators and/or UPS where identified through survey (API).

Shutdowns, circuit transfers and commissioning are to be done outside normal working hours, including nights and weekends, where the Trust requires it to protect clinical services (API).

The contractor provides labour, management, supervision, plant, materials, temporary works, specialist attendance, design, testing and documentation for a complete installation in accordance with the tender specification, drawings, CDM Pre-Construction Information and Contract Documents (API). CDM 2015 is the UK regime for construction design and management (HSE CDM 2015; SI 2015/51).

Dates and money

That is a design-and-build electrical works package of about four and a half months on site calendar, not a four-year FM term.

Who the buyer is

Epsom and St Helier University Hospitals NHS Trust is an NHS trust (ODS RVR), not a Companies House company (NHS.uk). St Helier Hospital is at Wrythe Lane, Carshalton SM5 1AA (NHS.uk hospital). The notice’s procurement address is 70 East Street, Epsom KT17 1HB (API) — that is the buyer’s procurement base, not the plant room.

The Trust operates in the St George’s, Epsom and St Helier Hospital Group (gesh). The two trusts remain legally separate, each with its own statutory Board, with one Group Executive (gesh page). Following Board approval in March 2026, the Group says it intends to submit a Strategic Outline Case to NHS England to merge; it expects that to take at least two years (gesh page). For this contract, the contracting authority on CF is still Epsom & St Helier University Hospitals NHS Trust (notice).

How you bid

Open procedure on MultiQuote, opportunity CA18340 (notice). Personal contact names on the notice are redacted here. Use the portal.

NHS electrical safety context (not a substitute for the ITT)

The notice names the Trust’s Authorised Person (Electrical) and live-hospital working. It does not name a Health Technical Memorandum on Contracts Finder. NHS England publishes HTM 06-02: Electrical safety guidance for low voltage systems (2023 update) for operation and management of LV systems in healthcare premises, intended to help duty holders meet the Electricity at Work Regulations (NHS England HTM 06-02; Electricity at Work Regulations 1989). Whether this ITT specifies HTM 06-02, BS 7671, or a Trust electrical safety policy is Unknown on CF — check the specification and PCI.

3. Mandatory pass/fail table vs published requirements

4. Incumbent / last award

This board — not found in public award data

There is no award array on CA18340 (awards: []) (API). This is a defined works package (replace one named board), not a re-let of a term electrical contract. The installer of the existing SP-3-3-21 is not named on Contracts Finder.

A bidder would find out by: the MultiQuote specification / existing-installation drawings; a clarification to the Trust AP (Electrical) via the portal; and, after the event, any award notice on Contracts Finder. Do not assume the recent lighting contractors below installed this board.

Pattern of recent SME-scale electrical / building awards by this Trust

These are other St Helier / ESTH packages, retrieved 1 September 2026. They show the Trust does buy electrical-ish works from named contractors at similar values. They are not incumbents for SP-3-3-21.

A. G & M Building Contractors Essex Ltd — emergency lighting at St Helier

Companies House snapshot — G & M BUILDING CONTRACTORS ESSEX LTD (07082549) (CH): Status Active; incorporated 20 November 2009; Private limited Company; registered office Unit 9 Little Malgraves Lower Dunton Road, Bulphan, Upminster, RM14 3TE; SIC 42990 — Construction of other civil engineering projects not elsewhere classified; last accounts made up to 30 November 2024. Turnover not on CH overview — omitted.

The same company also appears on an earlier St Helier roof covering award (CA10671, estimated value £140,000; awarded value published as 0 so the actual sum is omitted here) (API).

B. Hanevo Ltd — LED replacements

Companies House snapshot — HANEVO LTD (07941293) (CH): Active; incorporated 8 February 2012; registered office The Stables, 23b Lenten Street, Alton, GU34 1HG; SIC 42910 and 43999; previously UK South Engineers Limited (8 Feb 2012 – 7 Nov 2019); last accounts to 31 December 2024. Turnover not on overview — omitted.

C. Russell Cawberry Limited — emergency lighting continuation

Companies House snapshot — RUSSELL CAWBERRY LIMITED (02031233) (CH): Active; incorporated 25 June 1986; registered office 31 The Broadway, Cheam, SM3 8BL (matches the award address); SIC 41201 Construction of commercial buildings; last accounts to 31 March 2025. Turnover omitted.

What this pattern is worth: the Trust lets open, SME-flagged, MultiQuote electrical packages in the £80k–£200k band to active limited companies, including a Cheam contractor (SM3 — close to St Helier SM5). It does not identify who will win CA18340 and it does not name the incumbent for SP-3-3-21.

Same-Trust live companion notice (not this contract): CA18353 Roof Works 2, estimated £75,000, deadline 2 September 2026, 12:00 BST (API). Estates is running more than one short-dated works package this week. As of this site’s publication date (2 September 2026) that companion deadline is itself past or imminent; it is cited only as pattern.

5. Evaluation traps and likely social-value asks (tied to the notice text)

Traps on the notice

1. Clock. Deadline 4 September 2026, 12:00 BST; published 11 August 2026 (API). A design-and-replace LV board in a live hospital cannot be priced from the CF blurb alone. You need the drawings, PCI, circuit schedules and a survey. Two working days is not that.
2. “Nominal 250A, subject to Contractor design verification.” If you lump-sum a 250A Form 4 board and the load study says otherwise, you own the change (API).
3. 50 m of 120mm² 4c XLPE/SWA/LSF “subject to final design and site verification.” Same trap on cable length and containment in a basement plant room (API).
4. Temporary supplies are in the price. Generators and/or UPS “where identified through survey” — if you do not survey, you cannot identify, and you will either no-bid or underprice (API).
5. Isolation Impact Assessment is a deliverable, not an afterthought, and it is done with the Trust AP (Electrical) and clinical stakeholders (API). Bidders without a hospital shutdown method statement will look like tourists.
6. Nights and weekends (API). Price the labour multiplier or lose money on commissioning.
7. Fire stopping and builder’s work are in scope (API). An electrical-only quote that ignores compartmentation in an NHS basement is incomplete. The Trust has been buying fire-stopping packages separately (e.g. CA16184 “Creation of an electrical cupboard” awarded to G & M — published opportunity value £30,000, published award value £330,000; those two figures conflict on CF, so this memo does not rely on either as a benchmark) (API).
8. Thermographic inspection after energisation and full O&M / training / handover (API). Allow specialist attendance.
9. £150,000 may or may not cover temporary generation. If the pack’s out-of-hours and generator risk sits with the contractor, this number is tight. Do not invent a “should cost”.
10. CDM. PCI is referenced. Roles (principal contractor / principal designer) are not named on CF. Read the contract documents before you sign a design duty you cannot insure.

Social value — not on this notice

No weighting, no apprenticeship clause, no local-labour percentage on Contracts Finder. Unknown. For a five-month works package the ITT may still ask for local labour (the Cheam award above shows local contractors do win — CA16257) or a hospital-appropriate training/handover, which the notice already lists as a deliverable. Do not write a community essay the scoring matrix does not buy.

6. What would have to be true to flip the verdict

No-go → Qualify (52) only if, as at 1 September 2026, all of these are already true:

• You are registered on MultiQuote and have downloaded CA18340.
• You have attended or booked any site visit the pack requires.
• You can name a designer who will finish discrimination / load studies this week.
• You have a priced temporary-supply option (generator and/or UPS) and a night-shift gang.
• You have worked to a Trust Authorised Person (Electrical) before, or you have a documented hospital isolation method.
• You can hit Friday 4 September 2026, 12:00 BST without a heroic all-nighter that skips the Isolation Impact Assessment.

Qualify → Go would still need the pack’s insurance, turnover and accreditation gates to match your certificates — those gates are Unknown on CF.

Stay No-go if: you discovered this notice today; you are a commercial electrician without NHS live-environment work; you cannot resource nights; or you planned to “design later”.

A cleaner bid for the same buyer, if you do this work, is to watch the next MultiQuote package (they are running others this fortnight — e.g. roof works CA18353, deadline 2 September 2026, 12:00 (API)). Do not burn a bid team on a Friday-noon hospital board you have not surveyed.

7. Source list (URLs)

1. Live notice (HTML): https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Notice/45ad6b5d-26b2-4684-ac58-5d78d1de1fe1
2. Live notice (JSON): https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/api/rest/2/get_published_notice/json/45ad6b5d-26b2-4684-ac58-5d78d1de1fe1
3. Search API: https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/api/rest/2/search_notices/json — docs https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/apidocumentation/Notices/2/POST-rest-searches-search
4. MultiQuote: https://suppliers.multiquote.com
5. Trust (NHS.uk): https://www.nhs.uk/services/acute-trust/epsom-and-st-helier-university-hospitals-nhs-trust/RVR
6. St Helier Hospital: https://www.nhs.uk/services/hospital/st-helier-hospital/RVR05
7. gesh group: https://www.stgeorges.nhs.uk/about/st-georges-epsom-and-st-helier-hospital-group/
8. HTM 06-02: https://www.england.nhs.uk/publication/electrical-safety-guidance-for-low-voltage-systems-htm-06-02/
9. Electricity at Work Regulations 1989: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/1989/635/contents/made
10. CDM 2015 (HSE): https://www.hse.gov.uk/construction/cdm/2015/index.htm
11. CDM 2015 (legislation): https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2015/51/contents/made
12. CA16855 G&M lighting award: https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Notice/8f464bec-40f3-4eeb-b7cb-26991b51dcd5
13. CA16894 Hanevo LED award: https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Notice/d49dc76c-209c-4ab8-b1a9-142932b16be9
14. CA16257 Russell Cawberry lighting award: https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Notice/9d28a9e5-9aa0-4a92-9ba6-b0b07f4637cd
15. CA10671 G&M roof: https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Notice/28028943-f992-424c-b634-cc8a99de9a2e
16. CA18353 companion roof works: https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Notice/aa57f133-43e4-44d4-acd2-310678d6f06b
17. CH 07082549: https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/07082549
18. CH 07941293: https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/07941293
19. CH 02031233: https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/02031233
20. OGL v3.0: https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/
21. CA16184 (conflicting values; cited only as a warning, not a benchmark): https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/api/rest/2/get_published_notice/json/5e2f4baa-744d-45ce-87e6-2f30ec15110d

8. Disclaimer

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