Guidance

Business Appointment Rules for Crown Servants - Guidance

Updated 13 October 2025

Summary

The government’s Business Appointment Rules (the Rules) apply to all ministers and Crown servants, including members of the Civil Service. The Rules seek to protect the integrity of government, while enabling individuals to move to roles outside of government. The Rules are owned by the Cabinet Office. This page provides further guidance on the Rules for former civil servants, which includes special advisers and those serving in the Diplomatic Service. Former senior members of the armed forces and intelligence agencies should consult their department’s intranet or human resources team instead of contacting the Civil Service Commission.

There are different Business Appointment Rules and guidance for ministers.

If you are a Crown servant at the grade SCS2 (or equivalent) and below

The Business Appointment Rules will apply to you for:

• one year after leaving Crown service, if you are grade 6 or below
• two years after leaving Crown service, if you are grade SCS1 or SCS2.

For each appointment or role you want to take up within the relevant time period for your grade, you must review the Rules and discuss with your department human resources team to decide how they apply.

You only need to make an application if your circumstances match one of the following criteria:

• you have been involved in developing policy affecting your prospective employer, or have had access to unannounced government policy or other privileged information affecting your prospective employer, at any time in your last two years in Crown service
• you have been responsible for regulatory or any other decisions affecting your prospective employer, at any time in your last two years in Crown service
• you have had any official dealings with your prospective employer at any time in your last two years in the Crown service
• you have had official dealings of a continued or repeated nature with your prospective employer at any time during your Crown service career
• you have had access to commercially sensitive information of competitors of your prospective employer in the course of your official duties
• the proposed appointment or employment would involve making representations to, or lobbying the government on behalf of a new employer
• the proposed appointment or employment is consultancy work, either self-employed or as a member of a firm, and you have had official dealings with outside bodies or organisations in their last two years in Crown service that are involved in your proposed area of consultancy work

You should confirm your understanding of whether an application is required with your department human resources team and line manager. If an application is required, they will explain the next steps in the process, and where to send your completed application form.

If you are a Crown servant at grade SCS3 and above (or equivalent)

If you are a permanent secretary, director general, CEO of a Civil Service organisation, or special adviser, member of the armed forces or diplomat of equivalent grade, the Business Appointment Rules will apply to you for two years after leaving Crown service. You must apply for advice from the relevant advice provider before taking up or announcing any new appointment within these two years. This includes paid and unpaid appointments.

Submitting an application form

If you are required to submit an application form, you will be expected to provide clear evidence to demonstrate that the role is appropriate for someone who held your position in government. This includes detailed information about the role you wish to take up and any involvement you had in relevant matters during your time in the Civil Service. You must provide as much information as possible. Relevant government departments may be asked to verify this information and provide a view on the application. 

There are two types of application form:

• Level 1 application form for unpaid and other appointments where the risks to government integrity are lower, and 
• Level 2 application form for all other appointments. 

Level 1 applications

The Government recognises that there is a range of roles that do not pose as significant risk to government integrity as others (for example: unpaid work, academic positions, or journalism roles). For such positions, a briefer Level 1 application form will be used. Depending on the content in the application, you may be asked to provide further information. You should submit a Level 1 application form if your prospective role falls into any of the following categories: 

Role type	Notes
Unpaid roles	Roles are not unpaid if there is any reasonable expectation of remuneration – such as salary, bonuses and share options – including where the remuneration will be waived or donated to charity or other recipients in lieu of you receiving it
Non-executive charitable roles – e.g. trusteeships	Working for a charity in an executive capacity does not fall into this category
Academic roles, such as teaching, research or peer review	Working in non-academic roles in educational institutions does not fall into this category
Journalism and media appearances – e.g. writing a newspaper column, series of television, radio or podcast appearances	Corporate or management roles in media organisations do not fall into this category One-off media appearances do not require any application – see below
Joining speaking agencies	One-off speaking engagements do not require any application – see below

Level 2 applications

For all other paid roles, including proposals to establish consultancies, a Level 2 application must be made.

If you are unsure whether you need to submit an application, or how to do so, please contact your department, or the Civil Service Commission (if payband SCS3 or equivalent and above), at the earliest opportunity. Early approaches are encouraged and you can receive advice at any stage in the recruitment/offer process as long as it is before the role is announced or taken up.

You must not enter into any contractual agreement with a potential employer or client until you have received your final advice from the relevant decision maker. It is a breach of the government’s Rules to take up or announce a role before you have received your full and final advice.

What to expect

Once your application has been considered, the advice will be approved by the relevant decision maker, and you will receive a letter confirming the conditions to be applied to your acceptance of your new role.

The Rules do not prevent you from being able to draw on skills and experience gained from your time in office. However, all civil servants, current and former, are expected to maintain the confidentiality of privileged information they were exposed to during their time in government.

Standard conditions

If you are a former permanent secretary or SCS3 (and equivalents, including special advisers of equivalent standing), there are a set of conditions that individuals can expect the Civil Service Commission to apply in all cases, as set out below:

• Privileged information condition - You can draw on skills and experience gained from your time in government. However you must not, at any time, draw on (or disclose for the benefit of yourself or others) any privileged information.
• Lobbying condition - Any contact with the government, directly or indirectly must only be where it could not reasonably be perceived as lobbying.
• Contracts and bids condition - You must not work or advise on any bids to secure governmental funding or contracts. You may only work on or advise on the subject matter of contracts the organisation may have with the government (or related matters), provided you do not draw on any privileged information or contacts from your time in office (as per the condition above).
• Standard waiting periods - The government’s Rules set out standard waiting periods of a minimum of three months for former permanent secretaries and equivalents.

The Commission may advise that some of these standard conditions can be waived if, in their judgement, no questions of propriety or public concern could arise from their disapplication.

Additional conditions

Where there is a strong overlap between your responsibilities in office and the role you seek to accept, significant risks are more likely to arise.

Departments and the Commission may consider further measures in order to protect the integrity of government when considering advice in response to your prospective role, including:

• Additional restrictions - where there are risks associated with information and contacts gained in office, conditions which prevent working on specific matters will likely be considered. For example, this may include a restriction that would reduce the scope of your proposed role from specific sectors, subjects, and/or policy areas.
• A waiting period - to put a gap between access to information from your time in office and your first day undertaking your new role.
• Suitability - if conditions cannot mitigate the risks. For example, if you have been exposed to commercially sensitive information during your time in government, it is not always possible to mitigate the associated risks by applying conditions or a delay. In such cases, your department or the Commission will advise you that it is not appropriate for you to accept such a role.

Where you have been involved in decisions affecting the organisation directly, or have had access to sensitive information that may offer an unfair advantage to the organisation, you will be expected to demonstrate why it would not be improper, under the government’s Rules, to take up the role. It is expected that you will not work in the sector for which you held regulatory or commercial responsibility.

There are exceptions where individuals and departments can demonstrate how any such proposed role could be undertaken without any reasonable cause for concern under the Rules. 

Where applicants are returning to a former profession or career, this may reduce the risks. This is due to the experience gained by applicants in the sector before joining office. Therefore, where an applicant is returning to a former profession or career, this will be taken into consideration by departments or the Commission as a mitigating factor.

Confidentiality and transparency

For former officials at the SCS1 grade and above, the relevant department or the Commission will publish advice once the relevant appointment has been taken up or announced. The Commission will publish information on breaches of the government’s Rules by placing details on its website and in its annual report.

It is important to understand that the integrity of government is the sole focus of the Rules, and advice provided to applicants will express a view only on that single issue. Any advice published does not endorse the venture or its remuneration as a suitable one for a former official - that is a matter for the individual to justify.

Personal information is processed in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). More detail on how your personal information is handled can be found in the relevant privacy statement.

Additional guidance

What does ‘not disclose privileged information’ mean?

You can find further information relating to the ongoing duties of confidentiality that are expected of current and former civil servants detailed in section 4.2 of the Civil Service Management Code.

I received a restriction from lobbying - what does this mean?

Lobbying in the context of the Rules means that you should not engage in communication with government (including ministers, special advisers and officials/public office holders), wherever it takes place, to influence decisions, policies, or the awarding of contracts for your own benefit or that of an organisation you represent. Contact with former colleagues in government is permissible where it is clearly unrelated to lobbying, including at a social or party political level.

The Rules allow for communication as a routine part of the role where such activity would not be improper. Communication which is likely to be considered in keeping with the lobbying restriction may include: 

• sharing factual information transparently (reporting via published research, opinion pieces, reports, annual reports, or through formal consultation); or
• using existing and therefore implicitly agreed frameworks for contacts within government (but not making use of privileged networks) for routine communication. This includes: asking for/providing factual information/updates and responding to requests from the government (e.g. an invitation to a meeting or to participate in a roundtable).

Routine communication will be considered lobbying if it involves: 

• making contact with government on behalf of the organisation to make introductions or ask for meetings; 
• asking the government to make a decision, or 
• proactively promoting the organisation’s position on matters - unless being done through a formal consultations process or another process initiated by the government.

It is also expected that applicants will not take up roles that involve ‘in-house’ lobbying or join a lobbying firm without a clear separation from its lobbying work and a commitment from the employer demonstrating how the applicant’s work will be separated from lobbying.

What if I am setting up an independent consultancy?

Seeking advice on setting up an independent consultancy is just the first step in the process. You will be required to submit an application form for each and every client you intend to accept to your consultant for advice from either your former department or the Commission. All applications to set up an independent consultancy will therefore have a condition applied requiring an applicant to return for advice for each commission.

What if I am planning to work for an advisory/consulting firm which has a changing roster of clients that will not all be known at the time of my application? 

Where your prospective employer has unknown clients, and the department or the Commission cannot adequately assess all the risks associated, a restriction will normally be applied to you to limit the scope of your prospective new role to prevent potential conflicts with your former responsibilities during your time in the Civil Service that may arise. You will not be required to submit an application form for each and every client in this circumstance.

I plan to write an article in a newspaper; appear in a media broadcast or podcast; or make a speech - do I need to submit an application under the Rules?

The Rules do not regard ‘one-off’ activities such as speeches, broadcasts, or newspaper articles as ‘appointments or employment’. It is nonetheless expected that applicants uphold the highest standard of propriety, including acting in accordance with the Seven Principles of Public Life and their ongoing duty of confidentiality in undertaking such activities as set out in section 4.2 of the Civil Service Management Code.

Steps in the processing of applications from former Crown servants at SCS3 and above

The following is an example of the steps taken by the Civil Service Commission to process Level 2 applications received from civil servants at the SCS3 grade (and equivalents) and above.

• Applicant completes parts one and two of the application form and submits internally for the countersigning officer at the relevant department and their HR department to consider.
• Department completes the application form and sends it to the Civil Service Commission.
• The Commission considers information provided and makes any necessary additional requests for information from the relevant departments or agencies.
• Once all information is collated, the Commission considers the application and the conditions that should be applied to the appointment under the government’s Business Appointment Rules
• The Commission provides the applicant with a provisional recommendation.The applicant is asked to confirm if they are content to accept and abide by the provisional advice such as the conditions attached to the appointment. This is an opportunity for the applicant to ask questions or provide further information where necessary.
• The Commission finalises its recommendation, and submits it to the appropriate decision maker in the case. Once a final decision is made, the department and applicant are informed. The Commission will notify the new employer of the Commission’s advice. The applicant is asked to inform the Commission if/when the appointment is taken up/announced.
• If notified or made aware the appointment is taken up, the Commission’s advice is published on its website.