In a previous information notice, SPPA has said it was looking to “initiate engagement with the market for the provision and procurement of solutions required to manage the administration of pensions, payments and the provision of related customer and employer organisation interfaces and services”.

The pensions agency has looked to the IT industry seeking “views from potential providers and partners regarding delivering of part or all of the range of services”, the SPPA will consider bids including “on-line self-service facilities for scheme members covering a range of platforms and channels; integration with voice-based telephony services which may include the use of chat bots; data integration and interface coordination services with employer organisations and payment management services; analytics and reporting capabilities.”

The SPPA said the management of data should include “validation, enhancement and augmentation; workflow, activity and task management; and, opportunities for process automation and machine-based learning”.

In 2015, Capita won the contract with a bid later described by Audit Scotland as “abnormally low” in terms of overall costs. In a 2019 report, the watchdog also said that the 18-month timescale was “unrealistic”.

The contract was cancelled in February 2018 and Capita paid the SPPA £700,000 in November 2018 following the conclusion of a legal process, The Register reports. 

Audit Scotland’s auditor general, said: “Capita was not able to provide a working system and did not achieve any of the project milestones. This was a main contributor to the project failure.”

According to Audit Scotland, the SPPA spent £6.3m on the project and a further £2.4m extending contracts with existing suppliers when the project failed to meet the original timetable.

The report said that failure of the project meant that SPPA was “unable to progress strategic, business and workforce plans as originally intended” and SPPA  required an additional revenue budget of £9.8m between 2019/20 and 2022/23, as well as capital allocations of £13.6m over the next five years.

According to the new information notice, the SPPA intends to publish a contract notice in January 2021.