Financial strength of consortia as well as operator performance should be proactively monitored by the public partner to detect circumstances or events that may ultimately result in contractual agreements being terminated. This could occur, for example, from events that are beyond consortia capability e.g. a force majeure event (see 'Business continuity planning modification' treatment actions above) that leads to un-sustainability of contract, a risk event that exposes weaknesses in existing control actions or from service delivery under-performance. For the latter example, it could therefore be imperative that failure event / output exception reports are reviewed monthly (and incorporated into ongoing trend analysis that is reported quarterly).
For defaults that actually lead to a termination, a range of administrative / change of control functions such as issuing a termination notice; calculating and making compensation payments; dealing with insurance, indemnities and intellectual property issues; and transferring responsibility / change of ownership should be undertaken. Associated treatment actions may include enacting business continuity plans as well as conducting a final inspection of assets, transferring project documentation / knowledge, and orientating / up-skilling employees (see '6.4.5 End of concession hand-over'). Furthermore, the circumstances that led to the termination, including relevant risk and performance data, could be used to probe tenderers' ability and readiness to manage similar situations (in conjunction with assessing all other accountabilities and service requirements - that is, if the public partner is involved in this process).
As part of monitoring regimes and with regard to soft services, benchmarking and competitive market testing should be carried out periodically (the frequency will be stipulated in service agreements e.g. conducted every fifth year). The findings of such analyses may be an effective way for the public partner to identify suitable, alternative service providers (based both on cost and capability) who could temporarily deliver required services during the re-tendering process or to undertake the delivery of these services more permanently during the contract term.