The Crown Commercial Service (CCS) is an

executive agency An executive agency is a part of a government department that is treated as managerially and budgetarily separate, to carry out some part of the executive functions of the United Kingdom government, Scottish Government, Welsh Government or No ...

and trading fund of the

Cabinet Office The Cabinet Office is a Departments of the Government of the United Kingdom, ministerial department of the Government of the United Kingdom. It is responsible for supporting the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, prime minister and Cabinet ...

of the

UK Government His Majesty's Government, abbreviated to HM Government or otherwise UK Government, is the central government, central executive authority of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

. The CCS is responsible for managing the

procurement Procurement is the process of locating and agreeing to terms and purchasing goods, services, or other works from an external source, often with the use of a tendering or competitive bidding process. The term may also refer to a contractual ...

of common goods and services, increasing savings for the taxpayer by centralising buying requirements, and leading on procurement policy on behalf of the government.

History

CCS was originally created as the Buying Agency on 1 April 1991. On 1 April 2000, it became part of the newly established

Office of Government Commerce The Office of Government Commerce (OGC) was a Government of the United Kingdom, UK Government Office established as part of HM Treasury in 2000. It was moved into the Efficiency and Reform Group of the Cabinet Office in 2010, before being closed ...

(OGC) within

HM Treasury His Majesty's Treasury (HM Treasury or HMT), and informally referred to as the Treasury, is the Government of the United Kingdom’s economic and finance ministry. The Treasury is responsible for public spending, financial services policy, Tax ...

. On 1 April 2001, the Buying Agency, the Central Computer and Telecommunications Agency, Property Advisors to the Civil Estate and other units from the Treasury merged to form OGCbuying.solutions. The agency's name was changed to just Buying Solutions in April 2009. On 15 June 2010, it moved, along with its parent agency the OGC, to become part of the Efficiency and Reform Group within the

. Its name was changed to the Government Procurement Service (GPS) in July 2011. In January 2014 the GPS merged with the procurement management from government departments to form the Crown Commercial Service (CCS). According to the service's own data, CCS secured commercial benefits of £3.8billion in the financial year 2022/23.

Operations

CCS operates as a trading fund established under the Government Trading Funds Act 1973, as amended in 1990, with offices in

Liverpool Liverpool is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. It is situated on the eastern side of the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary, near the Irish Sea, north-west of London. With a population ...

Norwich Norwich () is a cathedral city and district of the county of Norfolk, England, of which it is the county town. It lies by the River Wensum, about north-east of London, north of Ipswich and east of Peterborough. The population of the Norwich ...

, Newport,

Leeds Leeds is a city in West Yorkshire, England. It is the largest settlement in Yorkshire and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds Metropolitan Borough, which is the second most populous district in the United Kingdom. It is built aro ...

and

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

Procurement services

CCS provides professional procurement services to the public sector to enable organisations to deliver improved value for money in their commercial activities and provide professional support when it matters, advising on technical issues, energy-saving and environmental improvements. CCS's operations, and formerly those of GPS, include a range of framework agreements, which are a set of pre-tendered agreements with a range of suppliers from whom public sector customers can purchase goods and services. In the field of IT, historical examples of framework agreements include CITHS frameworks ( commoditised IT hardware and software), ITHS (IT hardware and solutions), SPRINT II, Software Application Solutions, and Desktop21 for

desktop computer A desktop computer, often abbreviated as desktop, is a personal computer designed for regular use at a stationary location on or near a desk (as opposed to a portable computer) due to its size and power requirements. The most common configuratio ...

services. The SPRINT II agreement offered pre-negotiated deals on computer hardware and software. Its use was mandated from 4 March 2011, amidst some controversy, for purchases by police authorities in England and Wales of commoditised ICT hardware and off-the-shelf software under government regulations issued in 2011. Claims were put forward during the currency of the agreement that supplies were more expensive via the Sprint ii route than through other sales channels, although the claims were later retracted. A current () example is the Crown Hosting Data Centres framework, which can be accessed by all central government departments, arm's length bodies and the wider public sector. A small

commission In-Commission or commissioning may refer to: Business and contracting * Commission (remuneration), a form of payment to an agent for services rendered ** Commission (art), the purchase or the creation of a piece of art most often on behalf of anot ...

(typically less than 1%) is collected from the suppliers for each sale they make under these frameworks agreements.

Procurement policy

UK Government ''Procurement Policy Notes'' were in the past issued by CCS. These are now issued in the name of the Cabinet Office, but the CCS Helpdesk acts as the contact point for any queries. A separate series of ''Scottish Procurement Policy Notes'', and a parallel series of ''Construction Policy Notes'' issued since 2017 aiming to alert Scottish contracting authorities "to new policy, guidance and other matters relating to public sector

construction Construction are processes involved in delivering buildings, infrastructure, industrial facilities, and associated activities through to the end of their life. It typically starts with planning, financing, and design that continues until the a ...

", are published by the

Scottish Government The Scottish Government (, ) is the executive arm of the devolved government of Scotland. It was formed in 1999 as the Scottish Executive following the 1997 referendum on Scottish devolution, and is headquartered at St Andrew's House in ...

Management of the Government Secure Intranet (GSi)

As part of its support of the national government Internet infrastructure, CCS manages the UK's Government Secure Intranet (GSi), including the entire third-level government domain .gsi.gov.uk and its sub-domains.

References

External links

* *Cabinet Office, Efficiency and Reform Group, and Crown Commercial Service
Procurement policy notes
see als
Procurement policy notes
archived by the

National Archives National archives are the archives of a country. The concept evolved in various nations at the dawn of modernity based on the impact of nationalism upon bureaucratic processes of paperwork retention. Conceptual development From the Middle Ages i ...

on 14 July 2014, an
Procurement Policy Notes
archived on 5 April 2011 and dating back to 2006. {{Cabinet Office Executive agencies of the United Kingdom government Cabinet Office (United Kingdom) Trading funds of the United Kingdom government Government procurement in the United Kingdom 1991 establishments in the United Kingdom Government agencies established in 1991 Organisations based in Liverpool