FOI/202500448123 · FOI · not held
Use of procurement cards issued by the Scottish Government: FOI release
Information requested
The use of procurement cards issued by the Scottish Government for the period from September 2022 to December 2024, or the most recent available month. Specifically, I am requesting:
A detailed breakdown of all purchases made using procurement cards, regardless of value, including the following information for each transaction:
Date of transaction Merchant/supplier name Amount spent Description or category of the purchase If relevant, the minister who the purchase was made for If possible, department, division, or individual responsible for the expenditure
Can I please have this information displayed in an Excel sheet.
Can I also please ask how many members of staff have access to procurement cards?
Response
I enclose a copy of most of the information you requested in the format you asked for.
Whilst our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance the costs of locating, retrieving and providing all the information requested would exceed the upper cost limit of £600. This is due to the volume of transactions to be reviewed and personal information that would require redaction across 34,493 lines of data. Under section 12 of FOISA public authorities are not required to comply with a request for information if the authority estimates that the cost of complying would exceed the upper cost limit, which is currently set at £600 by Regulations made under section 12.
We have though provided the spend and the associated Merchant Category Code (MCC). The MCC descriptions are allocated by the bank to provide a general description of goods/services that the supplier provides.
Should you require transactional descriptions of the purchases made, you may, wish to consider reducing the scope of your request in order that the costs can be brought below £600. For example, you could specify the subject matter(s) you are interested in or to a specific business area of the Scottish Government, as this would allow us to limit the searches that would require to be conducted. You may also find it helpful to look at the Scottish Information Commissioner’s ‘Tips for requesting information under FOI and the EIRs’ on his website at: http://www.itspublicknowledge.info/YourRights/Tipsforrequesters.aspx.
For background, the ePC policy was revised and published in November 2023 and a link is attached below. The policy will provide context for what can and cannot be purchased using an ePC and how exemptions are applied for.
The data you have requested contains transactions prior to and post the policy revision.
https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-government-electronic-purchasing-card-epc-policy-2/documents/
We do not hold information on individual ministerial spend for purchases made using Scottish Government procurement cards.
As of 15 January 2025 there were 392 active electronic procurement cards within the Scottish Government.
About FOI
The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.
Detected exemption language
Under section 12 of FOISA public authorities are not required to comply with a request for information if the authority estimates that the cost of complying would exceed the upper cost limit, which is currently set at £600 by Regulations made under section 12. The policy will provide context for what can and cannot be purchased using an ePC and how exemptions are applied for.