Essex County Fire & Rescue Service

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FOI / 4145 / 2020 - Finance and accounts

 

Initial request and our response:

I am writing to you under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to request the following from your finance systems and Accounts Payable department: 

1. Invoice payment performance data for financial years 18/19 and 19/20:

 

Financial Year

18/19

19/20

Question

Volume

Value

Volume

Value
  1. How many invoices were paid late?

2478

£6,470,700

1909

£4,145,742
  1. How many invoices of SME suppliers were paid late?

315

£1,352,192

289

£560,991

3 a. How many successful claims have you processed for late payment of invoices?

2

Value of claim (not invoice)

£14.16

2

Value of claim (not invoice)

£25.02

3 b. How many claims have you rejected for late payment of invoices?

NOT RECORDED/NONE

Value of claim (not invoice)

NOT RECORDED/NONE

Value of claim (not invoice)

4 a. Do you have a documented process for late payment claims?

Yes

4 b. If yes, is this published and can it be shared?

It’s not ready to present yet. We will do so when it’s ready.

4 c. In the absence of a process, where should late payment claims be submitted?

Name of contact, department, email address, postal address, telephone number

Please email: finance@essex-fire.gov.uk

 

2. I am aware that many councils may publish a summary of their payment performance as required by the Public Contracts Regulations 2015. I am seeking the transaction detail that sits behind this.  This information should be readily available from your finance systems but if there are any difficulties in producing or sending the data please advise and I will provide any assistance necessary. I have provided a table that may help to present this information back.

We can give some further information but we are unable to release all the information because there is personal data in the detail. The published Transparency Data is at individual element level and details the supplier, amount and our reference (document number) as well as supplying the description of the item. You should be able to get the detail you require from that. It would be inappropriate for us to publish late payment information at this level because it may well be deemed to be commercial in confidence for the supplier(s) in question – especially if the sum is significant.