It has been our privilege to work for the NHS throughout the UK on countless projects over the last 30 years – from small fire and acoustic screens to multi-million pound projects using our bespoke specialist healthcare systems.
Over recent months, we have found we have been unable to get a credit rating on some small main contractors, and this leads to a myriad of problems that our NHS client remains unaware of until something goes wrong. Recently, a small main contractor, previously unknown to us, was awarded a glazing package worth £200,000 on behalf of the NHS, and has not paid our company for the first two phases. The contractor was vouched for by the NHS Trust. A simple five-minute credit search revealed a credit rating of £35,000 against Fendor’s project limit of £1.3 m, yet the contractor was still awarded a million pound package to oversee. The NHS client is supportive of Fendor, but has missing windows, and the project is in severe delay. In this case, the NHS client has informed us that the main contractor was paid for the works in 20 days. However, the company failed to pay us after 65 days, and we were consequently forced to give notice to remove our labour before completion to limit the financial damage to our company. We would urge all NHS Trusts to carefully consider who they appoint, to verify both the credit and contract value limits of sub-contractors such as ourselves, and also the main contractors they appoint to oversee their projects, as honourable companies such as ours do not wish to be placed in a position where we have to withdraw labour to get paid.
Sue Fortune-Duffy
Director Fendor
