CPV 85-1 Health services

About CPV 85-1

CPV 85-1 is the Common Procurement Vocabulary group covering health services. It is the clinical half of division 85, distinct from social work services in group 85-3, and it covers the delivery of healthcare rather than the equipment used to deliver it.

The group covers hospital and medical services, community health provision, out-of-hours and urgent care, diagnostics and imaging capacity, dental and ophthalmic services, mental health provision, therapy services, occupational health, ambulance and patient transport, and clinical staffing.

The most important thing for any supplier to understand is that healthcare services in England are no longer procured under general procurement law. The Provider Selection Regime replaced that approach, and it works on entirely different logic: rather than a presumption of competition, it gives commissioners defined routes to continue with an existing provider, select a single suitable provider, or run a competitive process, depending on the circumstances. A supplier expecting an open tender for every service will find far fewer than expected.

Active CPV 85-1 tenders

Live activity concentrates in community and out-of-hospital services, which is where commissioning is most active and where independent and voluntary sector providers compete most effectively. Diagnostic capacity is a second significant stream, driven by sustained demand for imaging and endoscopy beyond what NHS trusts can deliver in-house.

Clinical staffing is procured continuously through framework arrangements rather than individual competitions, and is a large market in its own right. Occupational health, a service almost every large public body buys, appears under this group and is procured well beyond the NHS.

Active sub-category	Typical procurement route	Primary buyer pattern
Community health services	Provider Selection Regime process	Integrated care board
Diagnostic and imaging capacity	Framework call-off or PSR process	ICB or NHS trust
Out-of-hours and urgent care	PSR competitive process	Integrated care board
Clinical staffing and locums	National framework	NHS trust or health board
Occupational health	Ordinary open procedure	Any public sector employer

Top buyers procuring CPV 85-1

Integrated care boards are the principal commissioners of health services in England, having absorbed most of the commissioning role that clinical commissioning groups held. NHS England retains direct commissioning for specialised services, some primary care, and national programmes. Individual NHS trusts procure clinical support, staffing, and subcontracted capacity.

Outside England the structures differ significantly. NHS Wales Shared Services Partnership acts as a central procurement function for the Welsh health boards and is among the most frequent publishers in our corpus under this group. In Scotland, NHS National Services Scotland performs a comparable national role alongside the territorial health boards, of which NHS Highland is a frequent publisher in our data. Northern Ireland commissions through integrated health and social care trusts.

Typical contract values under CPV 85-1

The median notice sits above a million pounds, reflecting the multi-year nature of service contracts covering a defined population. Community service contracts commissioned by an integrated care board typically run for three to five years with extension options, and value scales with population and scope rather than with activity volume.

The upper end covers whole-pathway commissions and large managed service arrangements, which reach into the tens of millions. Clinical staffing frameworks carry very large aggregate ceilings that reflect total anticipated spend across all suppliers rather than any individual supplier's earnings. Suppliers should be particularly careful with framework values in this group, as the published figures are frequently national totals.

Compliance and certifications for CPV 85-1 bidders

Care Quality Commission registration, or the equivalent from the Care Inspectorate, Healthcare Inspectorate Wales, or the Regulation and Quality Improvement Authority, is a precondition for regulated activities and is verified rather than assumed. Current ratings are used directly in selection.

Clinical governance requirements are extensive and specific: named clinical leadership, incident reporting arrangements, clinical audit, safeguarding leads, and appropriate professional registration for all clinical staff. Information governance is assessed through the Data Security and Protection Toolkit, which must be completed annually and at a satisfactory standard. Clinical negligence indemnity at the level the commissioner specifies is required, and the arrangements differ between NHS and independent providers. Where digital systems are involved, clinical safety standards require a named clinical safety officer and documented hazard assessment. Suppliers new to NHS contracting consistently underestimate the time these requirements take to satisfy, and they cannot be assembled inside a short tender window.

Frequently asked questions

Does the Provider Selection Regime mean fewer opportunities to bid?

Fewer open competitions, yes, but not necessarily less opportunity. The regime allows a commissioner to continue with an existing provider where the service is not changing considerably and the provider is performing well, which reduces the number of services coming to open market. It also requires commissioners to publish their intended decisions and provide a standstill period, which creates transparency that did not previously exist for many services. For a challenger provider the practical implication is that the route in is influence before the decision rather than competition after it, and that means engaging with commissioners well upstream of any published notice.

Does the regime apply outside England?

No. The Provider Selection Regime applies to healthcare services commissioned by relevant authorities in England. Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland continue under their own arrangements and, broadly, under ordinary procurement law with the light touch regime applying to health services. A provider operating across the United Kingdom faces materially different processes in each nation, and should not assume that experience of the English regime transfers.

Can independent and voluntary sector providers realistically win NHS services?

Yes, and the voluntary sector in particular is well represented in community, mental health, and preventative services, where local knowledge and reach into specific communities are genuine advantages. The obstacles are usually not clinical capability but infrastructure: information governance, clinical governance, indemnity, and the reporting requirements attached to NHS contracts. Smaller organisations frequently succeed by partnering, either as a subcontractor to a larger provider or in a consortium with a lead accountable body handling the contractual infrastructure.

Is occupational health really part of this group?

Yes, and it is worth noting because the buyers extend far beyond the NHS. Councils, police forces, fire services, universities, and central government departments all commission occupational health for their own workforces, and those procurements sit here under ordinary procurement rules rather than the Provider Selection Regime, since the buyer is not commissioning healthcare for patients. For a provider, it is a considerably more conventional market than clinical commissioning, with open competition, standard evaluation, and a wide buyer base.