The First 90 Days After Winning

Winning the contract is not the finish line. For care providers, the period between contract award and go-live is where reputations are built or broken. Commissioners judge you on mobilisation just as sharply as they judged your tender submission — and unlike a written response, mobilisation failures are visible in real time.

Too many providers treat mobilisation as an operational task to figure out after the champagne. The result: missed TUPE deadlines, commissioners chasing updates, service users left uncertain, and a risk register that exists only in someone’s head.

This guide walks through the first 90 days of contract mobilisation for care services — domiciliary care, supported living, children’s services, and patient transport — with specific actions, timelines, and governance structures that keep delivery on track.

If you need the underlying framework, our mobilisation plan guide covers the strategic approach. This article is about execution.

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Mobilisation Governance: Set the Structure Before Day One

The first thing to establish — before any operational work begins — is your governance structure. Without it, decisions stall, risks go unreported, and the commissioner loses confidence before you have delivered a single hour of care.

Project Board

Stand up a mobilisation project board within the first week of contract award. This is not your senior leadership team repurposed — it is a dedicated group with clear accountability for mobilisation delivery.

At minimum, the board needs:

• Mobilisation Lead — single point of accountability, named in the contract response
• Registered Manager (or incoming manager for the new service)
• HR Lead — critical where TUPE applies
• Finance Lead — payroll transitions, invoicing setup, cost tracking
• Commissioner Representative — invite them; most will attend or send a delegate

Named Leads and Escalation Routes

Every workstream needs a named lead, not a team. One person owns workforce onboarding. One person owns systems setup. One person owns stakeholder communications. When something slips, you need a name, not a committee.

Define escalation routes in writing during the first board meeting:

• Amber issues (at risk but recoverable) — escalate to Mobilisation Lead within 24 hours
• Red issues (delivery-threatening) — escalate to Project Board and commissioner within 48 hours

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TUPE Coordination: The Clock Starts Immediately

If you are taking over an existing service, TUPE (Transfer of Undertakings — Protection of Employment) is likely your most complex and time-sensitive workstream. Get it wrong and you face employment tribunal claims, delayed service starts, and a workforce that distrusts you before you have begun.

Timeline

TUPE consultation obligations are non-negotiable. The outgoing provider must supply Employee Liability Information (ELI) at least 28 days before the transfer date. In practice, you need to start pushing for this information the moment the contract is awarded.

A typical TUPE timeline for a domiciliary care contract transferring 40 staff:

• Week 1-2: Request ELI from outgoing provider via the commissioner; identify your HR lead and legal support
• Week 2-3: Receive ELI; begin due diligence on terms, conditions, pensions, and any ongoing issues (grievances, disciplinary, long-term sick)
• Week 3-5: Consultation period — meet with transferring staff (or their representatives); explain what will and will not change
• Week 5-6: Payroll transition — set up all transferring staff on your payroll system with correct terms, NI categories, pension enrolments
• Week 6-8: Issue new ID badges, DBS checks where needed (note: existing DBS checks typically transfer), mandatory training gap analysis

For more on handling TUPE in your tender responses, see our guide to TUPE in tender writing.

Common Pitfalls

• Assuming the outgoing provider will cooperate willingly. They often will not. Use the commissioner as leverage — they have a contractual relationship with the outgoing provider that includes cooperation obligations.
• Overlooking pension auto-enrolment. Transferring staff must be offered a pension scheme that meets the minimum TUPE requirements. If you are moving them from a defined benefit to a defined contribution scheme, this needs careful handling.
• Forgetting agency staff. Agency workers filling substantive posts may not transfer under TUPE, but you still need to cover those shifts from day one.

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Systems and Reporting Setup

Commissioners expect you to be reporting from week one of the live service. That means your systems need to be operational before go-live — not being configured during it.

Care Management Software

Whether you use Birdie, Access CM, Log my Care, or another platform, your care management system needs to be:

• Configured with service user records — migrated from the outgoing provider or built from commissioner referral data
• Populated with care plans — even if interim versions pending full assessments
• Accessible to all frontline staff — logins issued, app installed on devices, basic training completed

For domiciliary care contracts, electronic call monitoring (ECM) is typically a contractual requirement. Your ECM system must be live and logging visits from day one. Test it in the final week before go-live with dummy visits to confirm GPS accuracy, check-in/out functionality, and data flow to your reporting dashboard.

Scheduling

Build the rota at least two weeks before go-live. For a TUPE transfer, this means matching existing rounds as closely as possible in the first instance — service users and staff both need continuity. Optimise later, once the service is stable.

Reporting Templates

Ask the commissioner for their reporting template during the first project board meeting. If they do not have one, propose your own — covering:

• Hours delivered vs. hours commissioned
• Missed and late visits
• Safeguarding incidents
• Complaints and compliments
• Staffing levels (vacancies, sickness, agency use)

Having this ready before go-live signals competence. Sending your first report on time — even if the numbers are imperfect — signals reliability.

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Stakeholder Communications

Mobilisation is a communications exercise as much as an operational one. You are managing expectations across four audiences simultaneously.

Commissioner Updates

Provide written updates weekly, aligned to your project board cycle. Keep them factual: what is on track, what is at risk, what decisions you need from them. Commissioners do not want reassurance — they want evidence of grip.

Service Users and Families

For domiciliary care and supported living services, every service user (and their family or advocate) should receive:

• A letter or visit within 2 weeks of contract award — introducing your organisation, naming their new care coordinator, and confirming that their care will continue
• A face-to-face introduction before go-live — ideally with the care worker who will be providing their regular support
• A named contact for questions during the transition period

For children’s services, add the responsible social worker to every communication. For patient transport, communicate directly with referring clinicians or discharge coordinators.

Staff Communication

Transferring staff are anxious. They have heard promises from new providers before. Your credibility depends on:

• Responding to questions within 48 hours during consultation
• Being honest about what will change and what will not
• Delivering on small commitments (uniforms, ID badges, training dates) exactly when you said you would

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Risk Register and Issue Escalation

A risk register is not a compliance document to file and forget. During mobilisation, it is your primary management tool.

What to Track

Start with these categories and add service-specific risks:

Category	Example Risk	Likely Impact
Workforce	Outgoing provider delays ELI	TUPE consultation compressed, staff anxiety
Systems	ECM provider cannot meet go-live date	No visit data from day one, contract breach
Property	Keys/access codes not transferred	Staff locked out of supported living properties
Safeguarding	Incomplete handover of service user risk assessments	Unsafe care delivery
Finance	Invoicing template not agreed with commissioner	Cash flow delay

When to Escalate

The escalation routes you defined in Week 1 are useless if people do not use them. Build escalation into your board agenda — review every amber and red risk at every meeting. If a risk moves to red between meetings, do not wait. Call the Mobilisation Lead and notify the commissioner the same day.

Our mobilisation planning checklist provides a detailed breakdown of risks by workstream — use it to make sure nothing falls through the cracks during the transition.

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Early Performance Review Cadence

The first 90 days should include three formal checkpoints. These are not optional internal reviews — they are structured assessments that you share with the commissioner.

Week 4: Stability Check

• Are all TUPE transfers complete and staff on payroll?
• Is ECM/care management software operational and logging accurately?
• Have all service users had a face-to-face introduction?
• Are rotas stable, or are you relying heavily on agency cover?
• Any safeguarding incidents or complaints? Root cause analysis started?

Week 8: Performance Baseline

• Compare delivered hours against commissioned hours — where are the gaps?
• Staff retention since transfer — has anyone left? Why?
• Review care plan assessments — are they complete for all service users?
• First formal report to commissioner — does it match the agreed template?
• CQC notification obligations — anything reportable that has not been submitted?

Week 12: Transition to Business as Usual

• Is the service meeting all KPIs in the contract?
• Has the mobilisation project board been stood down, and has ongoing contract governance replaced it?
• Lessons learned documented — what would you do differently?
• Commissioner feedback sought and acted on
• Staff survey conducted — are transferring employees settled?

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From Mobilisation to Delivery

The best mobilisation plans are the ones that make themselves redundant. By Week 12, your project board should be dissolving into normal contract governance, your risk register should be thinning, and your commissioner should be receiving routine reports without having to chase.

If you are preparing a mobilisation plan for a live tender, download our mobilisation planning checklist — it covers every workstream in detail and maps directly to the governance structure outlined here.

And if you want a second pair of eyes on your mobilisation approach before you submit — or before you go live — we review mobilisation plans as part of our tender support work.