e) Departments should ensure that they have appropriate management resources to monitor the performance of a private sector partner.
SBS has to meet and exceed 42 key performance indicators spread across eight areas of operational services, designed to measure accuracy, timeliness and quality of service. National Savings has increased the resources it devotes to monitoring SBS's performance and aims, through effective business judgement, to incentivise performance improvement rather than apply a mechanistic formula of penalties (paragraph 2.10).
f) In entering into a long-term partnership, departments must ensure that the underlying contract reflects changes which will occur over time.
Detailed procedures have been agreed to facilitate the agreement of changes and incorporate them in the contract. Nevertheless, if SBS succeed in winning significant third party business, a proportion of staff and other assets may well be employed on both National Savings and third party work. It is therefore important that the contract should be varied using these agreed procedures so that the provisions for handing back staff and assets remain workable (paragraphs 2.16 to 2.18).