Contract Management and Client Monitoring

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There are currently three separate Leisure Management contracts, which are managed and monitored by the Sports and Recreation unit.

1. Leisure Management of Kingfisher, Tolworth Recreation Centre and Kingsmeadow
2. Leisure Management of the Malden Centre
3. Leisure Management of the Hawker Centre

All three contracts are termed 'deficit guarantee'. Under such an arrangement the contractor makes or receives a guaranteed annual payment to or from the Council each year. The sum payable is fixed (allowing for an annual inflation factor) even if the contractor fails to reach his income targets. The contractor can retain all income in excess of the fixed annual sum.

This type of contract has the following advantages:

1. It eliminates all of the operational based financial risk to the Authority, enabling more accurate planning and monitoring of the expenditure for these service areas;
2. Significant investment will often be undertaken by the Contractors in the leisure facilities in order to maximise market share and income. This is reflected in the £2.3m investment to date undertaken by the contractors in the facilities covered by the three contracts. This has resulted in improved leisure facilities for the community without the Authority needing to identify capital resources for the works.

The net payment received by the Authority across the three contracts is in excess of £400 000 per year. This payment together with the 'capital' invested by the Contractors makes Kingston's Leisure facilities amongst the most cost efficient in the region.

Under existing contractual arrangements DC Leisure Management Ltd hold the contracts for the Kingfisher, Malden Centre, Kingfisher and Kingsmeadow with Kingston YMCA holding the contract for the Hawker Centre.

The monitoring process employed is one, which seeks to encourage partnership working with our contractors rather than the more traditional 'adversarial' methods, which are commonly used. Thus specifications are viewed as a guide to each facilities operation rather than a 'book of rules'. This enables any issues arising to be discussed and rectified speedily and new programming initiatives to be quickly introduced in line with customer demand and expectation. This approach has resulted in a total annual throughput of over 1.8 million customers and has been adopted borough wide through the contractors charter.

Monitoring systems are never the less robust enough to protect the interest of both the Council and most importantly our users.

Each site is regularly inspected by Sports and Recreation staff and regular dialogue is maintained with site managers and other senior personnel from both DC Leisure and Kingston YMCA.

Additionally each site operates regular customer focus groups and comment card systems and seeks to create a family friendly atmosphere where all are welcome

Partnership with other local organisations is encouraged and work is currently taking place with local schools, the Primary care trust, GP's, the local Sports Council and the cardiac unit of Kingston Hospital.

For further information please contact us on 020 8547 4626/5210.