A£25 MILLION non-emergency transport service will benefit hospital patients across Cheshire from summer next year.

The new service will be provided by West Midlands Ambulance Service (WMAS) who are working with Eastern Cheshire and Blackpool CCGs to ensure it is in operation by July 2016.

Non-Emergency Patient Transport Service (NEPTS) will be available to people with medical needs which prevent them from using public or private transport and it would be detrimental to their health to travel without medically trained staff.

Jerry Hawker, chief officer of NHS Eastern Cheshire CCG and chief executive lead for Cheshire, Wirral and Warrington, said: “I’m very pleased with the outcome of the procurement process and am looking forward to working with WMAS.

“I hope that our local population will continue to experience a really high quality patient transport service and benefit from a number of quality improvements which have been incorporated in the contract, following engagement with hospitals, patients and commissioners.”

As well as Cheshire, patients in the Wirral and Warrington will also be eligible to access the service, which is to be ran separately to the current ‘blue light’ service.

Patrick Heywood, a Knutsford resident who served on the NEPTS procurement panel, said: "The process undertaken did involve the users and patients, which ensured that due consideration was given to the needs of Cheshire residents.

“The evaluation process was comprehensive and one had to determine if the submission meet a stringent criteria with marks were given for each element."

One of the new features of the service is a text-ahead system to alert users when their transport is due to arrive as well as ‘streamlined quality standards’ in order to improve arrival and collection times.

Mark Gough, WMAS Commercial Services Director, added: “We are delighted to have won this contract. We have a very strong team with vast experience in running PTS operations. Currently we complete around 700,000 PTS journeys per year.

“We will be implementing a tried and tested service delivery model that is used elsewhere including neighbouring Staffordshire where we operate a Patient Transport Service, Courier Transport Service and Commercial Services.

“We are particularly pleased that we have been able to keep this important contract within the NHS family and will be working with staff to ensure that we have a very strong presence in the county.”