Department for Education: Electronic Purchasing Card Solution

(asked on 9th December 2022) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to her Department’s publication of spending over £500 with an electronic purchasing card for May 2022, (a) for what purpose does her Department’s Higher Education and Further Education directorate require the subscription to Riddle.Com purchased on 6 May 2022, and (b) how many of the quizzes produced using that website since 6 May 2022 have been targeted at (i) internal and (ii) external audiences.


Answered by
Nick Gibb Portrait
Nick Gibb
This question was answered on 19th December 2022

The Department has spent £284,811.85 on purchasing goods and services with a value of less than £500 on a Government Procurement Card (GPC) from 1 April 2021 to 31 March 2022.

Information on expenditure over £500 by the Department by Government Procurement Card (GPC) and electronic Purchasing Card Solution (ePCS) can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/dfe-government-procurement-card-gpc-over-500.

All Government Procurement Card (GPC) and electronic Purchasing Card Solution (ePCS) transactions are governed by a strictly applied policy. All transactions must be approved by the Card Holder and authorised by a nominated secondary member of staff. Some purchases and transactions are not allowed. This includes purchases that are not for official business purposes, prohibited purchases (such as alcohol and vouchers), purchases that could be made via an alternative, compliant purchasing route, and other transactions such as the withdrawal or transfer of cash.

Information on spending over £500 by the Department on filming equipment with a GPC/ePCS is available in the attached table. These items were purchased by the central Policy Profession Unit, which is a cross Government unit serving approximately 32,000 civil servants in the Civil Service Policy Profession across the UK. These items contributed towards building communication capacity and to produce photos and filming for Policy Profession events, training, and communications. These items were purchased following a fully costed business case.

Multiply, a new programme for improving adult numeracy, is funded through the UK Shared Prosperity Fund. To engage potential students, the Department launched a quick mathematics quiz to help people understand where they might want to improve their numeracy. People are then signposted to relevant courses in their local area. The quiz function is provided by Riddle and can be found here: https://skillsforlife.campaign.gov.uk/courses/multiply/.

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