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At Crown Commercial Service (CCS) we understand that police forces, fire and rescue services, ambulance trusts, coastguards and other emergency services have more important things to handle than administrative issues and costly purchases.
We play an important role helping the UK public sector save money when buying common goods and services.
We are the biggest public procurement organisation in the UK. We use our commercial expertise to help buyers in central government and across the public and third sectors to purchase everything from locum doctors and laptops to police cars and electricity.
The collective purchasing power of our customers, plus our procurement knowledge, means we can get the best commercial deals in the interests of taxpayers.
Why buy through CCS
CCS helps thousands of public and third sector buyers in the UK with billions of pounds of spending each year. We have a wide range of commercial agreements to help you buy what you need, when you need, saving you time and money.
CCS commercial agreements use competition among suppliers to increase quality and value. In 2022/23, CCS helped the public sector to achieve commercial benefits equal to £3.8 billion – supporting world-class public services that offer best value for taxpayers.
Emergency service organisations can buy a wide and varied range of common goods and services through CCS. For example:
- police cars
- vehicle charging solutions
- traffic monitoring and enforcement solutions
- facilities management
- utilities
- network and connectivity solutions
- building materials
- digital specialists
Procurement regulations oblige public sector bodies to tender (seek bids) from suppliers when they want to buy goods and services above a certain value. Buying through CCS simplifies this process for buyers while ensuring compliance with procurement regulations.
Our commercial agreements have standardised contract terms and guidance for buyers. Our service is free to use for public sector and third sector organisations.
We have commercial expertise, deep knowledge of product and service categories, and national buying power.
How buying through CCS is organised
Everyday purchases, such as office supplies, are available from CCS catalogues and can be bought online for rapid delivery. Catalogues currently include technology products, office supplies and multi-function devices for printing, copying and scanning.
CCS publishes commercial agreements for more complex requirements. For example, for buying a fleet of vehicles or for legal advice. We call these frameworks.
A framework comprises a description of common public sector requirements, a list of suppliers who have been evaluated as capable of delivering the requirements, and standardised contract terms. Frameworks are often divided into lots, typically by product or service type.
You can buy from a framework in various ways, such as running a further competition among suppliers.
Advantages of buying through CCS
- buyers get competitive prices because suppliers can sell large volumes of their products and services to UK public sector organisations as though they were supplying a single customer
- CCS vets and reviews suppliers regularly. This saves you time finding suppliers and checking their reliability
- a large number of suppliers from multinational companies to small and medium sized business (SMEs)
- contracts include performance management, obliging suppliers to improve value and service over time
- contracts comply with public sector procurement regulations
- standardised contract terms reduce administration
Find out more about how we can help
In public procurement, one size doesn’t fit all. That’s why we have a team of specialist industry experts to help you achieve the very best value for your organisation.
How we can help you
By making your buying decisions with CCS, you will have access to:
- our commercial solutions and assisted service free of charge
- a dedicated account management team on hand to help you identify the right agreement to achieve the best possible value
- our category expertise and national buying power
By working together, you can tap into our national buying power and join the growing number of emergency service customers saving money for their organisations every year.
You can find a full list of all the commercial agreements we offer, alongside details of how we can help you build policy considerations into your procurement, in our interactive digital brochure.