Following procurement, the Bank awarded a fixed-price contract to Accenture. This covered both the design, build and testing of the core RTGS settlement and ledger components, and oversight of the end-to- end systems integration (that is, ensuring the core components worked as intended with the many other components of the RTGS).30 We recognise that awarding a fixed-price contract is very unusual for a digital transformation programme. The Bank highlighted to us how this had been made possible by its early work on specifying requirements and refining designs through the procurement process.31 The Bank told us it drew on the “best of breed – the best of all the designs” and ideas from all the bids in finalising the system design.32 The NAO report noted that the system design when the contract was let was close to that of the new RTGS when it was launched, supporting the Bank’s choice of approach.33 Modernising the RTGS and moving away from legacy