Becoming a supplier

We provide a range of integrated, secure services to UK and friendly foreign governments around the world. Our services include:

protective security
estates and construction
communications and monitoring
digital support and hosting
logistics
translation and interpreting

We work with suppliers in the UK and across the globe to keep our customers’ people, information and assets safe. We are proud to have had our most successful year in revenue terms in 2019 to 2020, and are continuing to grow.

As a trading fund, we are part of UK government. This means our suppliers are asked to demonstrate a high level of assurance, to ensure they meet government standards.

Once we have these assurances, we work closely to support you. We will provide references for work with other organisations. During the coronavirus pandemic, we took several measures to protect our suppliers.

How to find opportunities

We advertise opportunities for suppliers on:

Find a Tender Services (FTS)
the FCDO eSourcing Portal (as we share this portal with the FCDO, our opportunities are tagged as ‘FCDO Services’)
Contracts Finder (only for contracts over £10,000)

We also issue competitions that range from a straightforward comparison of quotations to a formal sealed tender process. The type of competition we run depends on the commercial, operational and legal risks involved.

For purchases below £10,000 we use government procurement cards where possible.

Terms and conditions for our suppliers

We normally contract using our standard terms and conditions. The exceptions to this include:

contracts placed under pre-existing framework agreements, including frameworks set up by the Crown Commercial Service and other government organisations
all other competed contracts
contracts with large-scale, complex requirements

We follow a supplier assurance process to ensure our suppliers meet data protection and information security requirements. This means you may need to complete a supplier assurance declaration and processing agreement where appropriate.

Supporting our suppliers

We value our suppliers, and have several policies to support you.

Prompt payment policy

We aim to pay 80% of all valid invoices within 5 working days from receipt, to meet the government’s prompt payment initiative.

Our standard terms and conditions require us to pay valid invoices within 30 days. Read FCDO Services latest prompt payment data on GOV.UK.

If you let a sub-contract in connection with an FCDO Services contract, we expect you to include similar prompt payment terms in your payments to sub-contractors.

Small and medium enterprises (SMEs)

See the European Union definition of an SME.

We support the government’s SME target of awarding 33% of spend with third-party suppliers to SMEs. We are working towards this target by:

following government guidelines and principles
regularly reviewing our procurement plans to ensure that they do not prohibit SME involvement
researching the market and developing appropriate market engagement strategies to encourage competition and attract a diverse range of suppliers
tracking the amount of expenditure awarded to SMEs
advertising our contracts in a transparent way

In the last financial year, we awarded X of third-party spend to SMEs.

Transparency

We support the government’s transparency in procurement initiative. To meet regulations, we publish details of our procurement opportunities and all contract award and purchase order contracts over £10,000 on Contracts Finder.

Sustainable procurement

We practice sustainable procurement to achieve value for money while minimising environmental damage and waste.

Guidance on bribery, modern slavery & ethical procurement

We work hard to procure responsibly. All FCDO Services staff must:

follow a code of conduct, in our anti bribery and corruption policy, to ensure our business remains free of bribery and corruption
abide by our corporate ethical standards by following our ethical code

Additionally, we expect all FCDO Services staff engaged in procurement to:

act in a professional and impartial manner
act in accordance with the Bribery Act 2010
take the CIPS Ethical Procurement and Supply e-learning course every year

You can read more about our corporate values by visiting our corporate social responsibility page. We have been awarded the CIPS Corporate Ethics mark and appear on the CIPS Corporate Ethics register.

We also expect our suppliers to meet high standards in integrity and professionalism in their working practices.

Our ethics policy statement for suppliers and sub-contractors sets out the core principles that our suppliers and their sub-contractors must follow. All contracted suppliers are required to declare their working practices meet the minimum standards.

We expect our suppliers to act in accordance with the Bribery Act 2010.