Nottingham City Council has approved spending of £170,000 on a water supply contract for Highfields Leisure Park, with the full cost expected to be recovered from tenants.
A decision published on Tuesday 16 June, confirms the council will award the contract to Wave Utilities Ltd through the ESPO Water, Wastewater and Ancillary Services Framework.
The contract relates to the continued management of an existing council-owned water supply asset at Highfields Leisure Park, which serves multiple business tenants through a single metered network.
The approved £170,000 expenditure is revenue spending, not capital spending, and has been approved through the council’s Spend Control Board. The council says there will be no net cost to Nottingham City Council because all water supply costs will be recovered through recharges to tenants at Highfields Leisure Park.
The arrangement is needed to ensure the council complies with its statutory responsibilities under the Water Industry Act 1991. It also says the ESPO framework provides a compliant procurement route, with supplier checks, standard contract terms and arrangements intended to demonstrate best value.
The report explains that water infrastructure at the site remains a council-owned asset, meaning the authority is responsible for ensuring water consumption is accurately billed and recovered from end users. In practical terms, the council will pay the supplier and then recharge the relevant costs to tenants at the leisure park.
The council says this approach follows how its utilities department already manages a number of Nottingham City Council sites across the city, with costs then recharged to the appropriate departments or budgets.
The report says there have been “ongoing and well-documented issues” over the past 12 months with billing processes, including delays in invoices being issued and a lack of clarity over account balances and reconciliation. These issues have required officer time to investigate, challenge and resolve, creating what the decision notice describes as an avoidable administrative burden on the Utilities Management team.
The council says using the ESPO framework is expected to improve billing accuracy, reduce administrative work and provide clearer escalation routes if problems arise.
The decision also rules out using a Water Self-Supply Licence because water costs need to be recharged to third-party tenants at Highfields Leisure Park. The council says this makes self-supply unsuitable and means a compliant retail water supply arrangement is required instead.