Defence Equipment

(asked on 4th February 2015) - View Source

Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many invoices and to what value were paid by Defence Equipment and Supply after the statutory 30 days as required under the EU Directive 2011/7/EU in the last 12 months.


Answered by
 Portrait
Julian Brazier
This question was answered on 17th March 2015

The Ministry of Defence's invoices are paid through the Defence Business Services organisation with the exception of some payments to suppliers made by units locally. We do not hold separate statistics of invoices settled on behalf of Defence Equipment & Support, however, across the Department, 8,647 invoices (or 0.2% of the total) amounting to circa £170 million were not paid within 30 calendar days during the 2013-14 financial year, of which over 80% were below £10,000 in value. Delays in paying bills are principally caused by the incorrect presentation of invoices.

We process over four million invoices a year totalling some £26 billion. Over the course of the last full financial year (2013-14), Defence Business Services paid 99.99% of all correctly submitted invoices within 11 calendar days and 95.42% of invoices within five working days.

We are committed to paying our suppliers promptly. Further, we place a contractual obligation on them to pay their subcontractors within a specified period from receipt of a valid invoice and to disseminate this requirement through their own supply chains.

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