1005-366 Procurement Support - B Grade - April 2025

Job title:Procurement Support Grade: B Vacancy type: Temporary for 6 months possibility to go to 12 months Hours: 35 Salary:27940 Location: Inverness other locations will be considered Closing date: Midnight 11 May 2025 Internal Interviews: 20 May 2025 External Interviews 4 June 2025

Job Purpose Summary

This is an excellent opportunity to work with NatureScot whilst learning on the job. It is a development role aimed at those starting out or in the early / next stages of their Procurement career. You will gain a variety of skills and on the job experience within the role and specific team.

The role sits within the Finance Planning and Performance unit. In this Procurement Support Officer role you will be part of the Procurement Team a team of four 4 which provides procurement services to the organisation. The role includes supporting the procurement team and associated procurement processes.

The procurement function is there to support the organisations project managers by not only ensuring compliance with procurement regulations but also to enable the delivery of highquality services at an affordable price and in doing so provide the best value to the organisation. Ensure good procurement principles are adopted such as sustainability equality ethical practices fairness openness and transparency across all procurement activities.

The range of activities/tasks in the procurement team can be varied and will therefore require some understanding of office routines and public sector procurement practices. As a consequence some planning and organising of own workload is required to ensure that workflow is maintained. The nature of planning and organising in this role is essentially around timing and sequencing of assigned activities/tasks i.e. working out the most effective way in which to carry out particular activities / tasks or make sure the deadline is met.

The role also includes undertaking and providing support for all financial transactional processing responsibilities using NatureScots (NS) electronic ePurchasing system (FUSION).

Key Areas of Responsibility & Role Requirements

TENDERS & CONTRACTS
Tendering and letting of contracts Support Procurement Officers with duties relating to tendering and letting regulated contractsi.e. provide administrative support with the development of tender documentation; downloading and saving bids from the Public Contracts Scotland website (PCS); support the evaluation process etc.

PROCUREMENT ADVICE
Provide basic procurement advice guidance and support to internal customers on all procurement matters. Escalate complex or contentious matters to the relevant Procurement Officer or the Procurement Manager.

FINANCIAL TRANSACTIONAL PROCESSING RESPONSIBILITIES
Using NatureScots ePurchasing system (Fusion) undertake the following activities in a timely manner:

Fusion Procurement provide a helpdesk service to internal customers in a timely and efficient manner this includes providing support guidance and advice. Participate in any testing of Fusion that may be required from time to time.

Fusion Requisitions compliance check electronic requisitions and generate purchase orders using Fusion.

Housekeeping provide cover during periods of absence relative to housekeeping activities. Housekeeping activities include creating and issuing housekeeping reports within the required timescales and taking the necessary corrective action to ensure the delivery of accurate spend report information.

Compliance Checking Purchase Orders 1000 to 50000 provide cover during periods of absence relative to retrospective compliance checking of purchase orders with a value of 1000 to 50000 within the required timescales. Compliance Checking includes but not limited to running necessary report and checks.

Collaborative & INTERNAL CONTRACTS
Oversee and look after various internal and collaborative external contracts/frameworks. These may be frameworks NatureScot have set up or using an external framework for the delivery of its key services i.e. Utilities Franking Machines Stationery and Paper etc. Key responsibilities include but are not limited to maintaining close liaison with internal and external customers including addressing any issues raised by internal customers. Responding to suppliers and framework owners in a timely manner. Act as the first point of contact for both internal and external customers.

GENRAL ADMINISTRATION ACTIVITIES
Activities include but not limited to:

Procurement & Contract Advertising Mailboxes monitoring and responding to queries received in the Procurement and Contract Advertising email boxes.

General administration of the Procurement internal contracts register.

Providing general administrative support to the Procurement Officers relative to tendering exercises i.e. collating and distributing tender documentation including but not limited to posting contract notices and contract award notices etc. on the appropriate platform. Downloading tender submissions from the electronic tendering platform and saving into the appropriate files etc.

Support and contribute to the maintenance of procurement related templates guidance documents processes and internal systems.

Support Procurement Officer with collating spend data and submitting into the Scottish Government Information Hub.

Skills

Please include in your supporting statement demonstrable examples of how you meet the key areas of responsibility the requirement of the role and the key skill requirements as described above and below.

Key skills & experience required are as follows (Please refer to these in your Supporting Statements)

• Provide details of any previous experience of working as part of a team ideally in an office/administrative role or in a public sector purchasing environment for example but not limited to any involvement with the tendering (requesting quotations etc. and letting of contracts.
• Demonstrate experience of good accuracy and attention to detail with both numeracy and written communications and working to tight deadlines. Ability to be flexible and adaptable in response to changing priorities.
• Demonstrate experienceof using relevant IT systems i.e. email MS Word Excel Microsoft Teams and ability to learn other systems quickly.
• Demonstrate goodinterpersonal skills that contribute to collaborative / team working and customer orientated service provision.
• Demonstrate ability to effectively planand manage a varied workload and prioritise as appropriate. Good organisational and time management skills.
• Demonstrate ability to use ones own initiative for problem solving.

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