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The following BSI references relate to the work on this document:
Committee reference QS/1/2
Draft for comment 19/30383866 DC

Foreword

Publishing information

This British Standard is published by BSI Standards Limited, under licence from The British Standards Institution, and came into effect on 31 May 2019. It was prepared under the authority of Technical Committee QS/001, Quality management and quality assurance procedures. A list of organizations represented on this committee can be obtained on request to its secretary.

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Requirements in this standard are drafted in accordance with Rules for the structure and drafting of UK standards, subclause J.1.1, which states, “Requirements should be expressed using wording such as: ‘When tested as described in Annex A, the product shall ...’”. This means that only those products that are capable of passing the specified test will be deemed to conform to this standard.

Contractual and legal considerations

This publication does not purport to include all the necessary provisions of a contract. Users are responsible for its correct application.

Compliance with a British Standard cannot confer immunity from legal obligations.

0 Introduction

There is broad concern about the value for money, quality, ethics and transparency of business relationships within the procurement process and supply chain, particularly with regards to public procurement in the UK.

This British Standard provides a framework to enable those in the procurement process to more accurately demonstrate or assess the trustworthiness of organizations tendering for and procuring public sector contracts.

It is important that public sector contracts are awarded to the most suitable organization which provides products or services in the best way, without compromising ethics, quality or value for money.

Many new or smaller organizations experience barriers to entering into the public procurement supply chain because of the actual or perceived complexity of the tender process and blanket requirements, regardless of the context of the organization or the size or complexity of the contract.

This British Standard is intended to address these issues and to:

support and simplify access to the public sector procurement process;
support existing sector and other policies, regulations and schemes;
be used as part of the due diligence process during tendering for and procuring public sector contracts;
provide a single generic assurance framework to reduce bureaucracy;
provide assurance that contracts are awarded fairly and to organizations that can be trusted to behave ethically, deliver what is required and offer value for money without compromising quality, and
mutually deliver good value for the taxpayer and end users.

Public sector contracts vary significantly. Different procuring bodies need different types of products and services ranging from the highly complex and costly, such as major infrastructure projects, to simpler or less complex service contracts, such as gardening or window cleaning.

To address the diversity of contract types this British Standard identifies three categories of contract, as follows.

Category A – contracts of high criticality, value, risk and complexity, or a combination of these factors, as determined by the contracting authority.
Category B – contracts of moderate or standard criticality, value, risk and complexity, or a combination of these factors, as determined by the contracting authority.
Category C – contracts of low criticality, value, risk or complexity as determined by the contracting authority.

This British Standard can be used by organizations of all sizes and levels of maturity to demonstrate suitability to one or more of the different categories of contract. Whilst any organization claiming conformity to this British Standard needs to meet all requirements, the degree of evidence required to demonstrate suitability differs for each category (see Annex A for more information).

1 Scope

This British Standard specifies generic requirements to demonstrate an organization’s:

suitability as an external provider of products and services to the public sector; and
ability to work collaboratively to meet the requirements of the contracting authority.

This British Standard is applicable to any organization, regardless of type, size or the nature of its activities and can be used by organizations:

contracting out provision of products and services to external providers; and/or
acting as external providers throughout the supply chain.

NOTE 1 This British Standard can also be used by organizations involved in non-public sector procurement.

NOTE 2 All of the criteria in this British Standard should be met to claim conformity for any category of contract.

2 Normative references

3 Terms and definitions

4 Context of the organization

5 Organizational governance

5.1 Governance

5.2 Leadership and commitment

5.3 Ethics, social responsibility and sustainability

6 Risk and opportunity management

6.1 General

6.2 Management of risk

7 Financial and commercial accountability

7.1 General

7.2 Value

7.3 Fair and prompt payment

8 Quality management

8.1 General

8.2 Product and service

9 Procurement and the supply chain

10 Performance evaluation

10.1 General

10.2 Customer satisfaction

11 People

11.1 General

11.2 Competence

11.3 Communication

12 Improvement

Bibliography

BS 95009:2019

Public sector procurement. Generic requirements for organizations providing products and services

Current

Published:

31 May 2019