Legal Services Panel

General legal advice and services for central government, including finance and complex legal services. Provides for a wide range of commonly needed areas of law, including contracts, dispute resolution and litigation, real estate and corporate finance.

Updates

11/11/22: Other public sector buyers (including wider public sector organisations) should consider using RM6240 Public Sector Legal Services. RM6240 replaces RM3788 Wider Public Sector Legal Services which has expired.

Description

Provides a simple route to market for buying a wide range of legal services. These are split across 2 lots:

  • lot 1: general legal advice and services
  • lot 2: finance and complex legal services 

We developed this agreement in partnership with the Government Legal Department (GLD).

It is the default route to market for buying legal services for all central government departments and their executive agencies and will replace the following agreements:

  • RM3786 General Legal Advice Services (expired on 27 December 2021)
  • RM3787 Finance and Complex Legal Services (expired on 20 December 2021)

Some of the 60 legal specialisms available to access through this agreement includes:

  • contracts
  • corporate finance
  • dispute resolution and litigation
  • employment law
  • high value or complex merger and acquisition activity
  • intellectual property law
  • public procurement law
  • real estate and real estate finance
  • rescue, restructuring and insolvency
  • projects of exceptional innovation and complexity
  • public inquiries and inquests

Suppliers provide legal services in the law of England and Wales. They may also be able to provide support and advice on Scots, Northern Irish and public and private international law, in respect of the specialisms covered under each applicable lot.

Call-off contracts can be of any value and length, although they must expire no later than 2 years after the agreement end date.

Benefits

  • flexible route to market with the option to award through further competition or direct award
  • access discounted rates when at least one of three discount thresholds are met
    • these discounts depend on the amount of work the suppliers have under the agreement
    • if the amount of work hits one of the thresholds, all customers will get a discount
  • specialist scope for a wide range of specialisms, including finance and complex legal services
  • ability to agree alternative fee arrangements and further rate reductions
  • flexible terms and conditions, as based on the Public Sector Contract
  • encouragement of innovative solutions, to minimise cost and maximise efficiencies
  • value added benefits such as secondments, exchange schemes, training, meeting and event space and strategic support
  • robust agreement management with CCS and GLD monitoring all suppliers for quality, performance and value for money
  • up to 2 hours free legal advice / consultation at the beginning of each contract

Products and suppliers

There are 17 suppliers on this agreement

Lot 1: General Legal Advice Services

Expires:

12 suppliers

Lot 2: Financial and Complex Legal Services

Expires:

7 suppliers

How to buy

Before using this agreement you will need to read our customer guide. This document will help you to select the right award procedure for your needs.

You can buy services under this agreement in two ways:

  • further competition
  • direct award

Before taking part in either a further competition or direct award, you will need to complete framework schedule 6 (order form template and call-off schedules).

Apart from framework schedule 6, there are no templates that you need to complete as part of your call-off procedure. You may use your own internal tender documents as part of your bid pack.

You can use our eSourcing tool to run your further competition or direct award. If this is your first time using the eSourcing suite, you will need to register an account. If you have already registered, you can log into your eSourcing account.

You should check your own internal policies and processes to make sure they follow your standard operating procedures.

Further competition 

To award a call-off contract through further competition you should:

  1. develop a clear specification of your needs 
  2. use the available tools to shortlist the number of suppliers you invite to bid (where suitable)
  3. use framework schedule 6 (order form template and call-off schedules) as the basis of your call-off contract
    1. amend or refine your contract deliverables, including liability caps
  4. develop your further competition award criteria, including your intended pricing mechanism
      1. this will form the basis of your decision to award your call-off contract
  5. invite all identified suppliers to submit a tender in writing by publishing your tender documents in line with the Public Contract Regulations
      1. this can be by email or through your preferred e-Sourcing tool 
      2. find contact details for each supplier representative in the RM6179 supplier contacts document
  6. set a time limit for the submission of tenders, (take into account the time needed to create and submit tenders and the complexity of your needs)
  7. keep each tender confidential until the time limit set out for the return of tenders has expired
  8. apply your published award criteria to each submitted tender
  9. award your call-off contract by sending a completed and signed framework schedule 6 to the successful supplier
    1. suppliers should promptly sign and return this document (this can be done electronically)
  10. provide unsuccessful suppliers with written feedback on why their tenders were unsuccessful
  11. publish your contract on Contracts Finder for transparency purposes

Direct award works

To direct award under this agreement you should:

  1. develop a clear specification of your needs
  2. determine which suppliers are capable of meeting your needs by reviewing the capability matrix
  3. apply the direct award criteria to the prospectuses for each capable supplier to establish which supplier provides the most economically advantageous solution
  4. contact the supplier that you have selected and provide them with your specification so that they can complete their conflict of interest checks and confirm that they have the relevant capability and capacity
  5. if you wish for the work to be undertaken under an alternative fee arrangement, ask for a fee quote
  6. award the call-off contract with the supplier by sending a completed and signed framework schedule 6 (order form template and call-off schedules)
    1. suppliers should promptly sign and return (this can be done electronically)

Documents