Accident Compensation Corporation chief information officer Graeme Osborne has refused to comment on suggestions Gen-i used a whole-of-business discounting arrangement with its parent, Telecom New Zealand, in its successful bid to win a major ACC services contact.
The Gen-i-led consortium will supply services to the state-owned insurer for operations, help-desk, networks and desktops over the next five years.
Others in the consortium include Sun, iData and Red Rock Consulting.
Computerworld has been told Gen-i included a value-add clause in its bid, offering an additional discount on all revenues above a certain number.
That would mean that the combined spend for IT and voice communications would attract a “whole of book” discount of 25% once this number was exceeded, says the source.
The source claims this is an example of monopoly-pricing being used to buy business.
However, a Gen-i spokesperson says there was no linkage between the services bid and telecommunications.
Osborne says any agreement between ACC and a supplier is commercial and in confidence.
“A general comment I would make is that while price is an important factor it is rarely the deciding factor in selecting suppliers, especially for multi-year services-based contracts,” he says.
IBM, which partnered with Infinity, was the under-bidder on the short-list for the contract.
The incumbent, Unisys, did not make the short list.
ACC and Gen-i are expected to conclude contract negotiations by the end of August.