Capgemini wins £600M HMRC contact center deal as £2.4B CRM contract slips

HM Revenue and Customs has awarded Capgemini a £600 million contract to run its contact center operations, while simultaneously delaying the award of its much larger £2.4 billion customer relationship management system by three months. The 10-year Contact Centre as a Service deal was signed on 27 April.

The contract, which includes VAT, received 13 bids and has also shortlisted Canadian firm CGI as a potential alternative. Capgemini will use Bristol based Route 101 and US provider Nice Systems as subcontractors, according to the contract notice.

Capgemini deepens HMRC ties

Capgemini is already one of HMRC's largest suppliers. In July 2025, the tax authority awarded the company a £107 million extension to support systems built under the Aspire project, a two decade old IT program. Capgemini's UK unit also lists development of HMRC's mobile app among its case studies.

The new contact center contract is part of a broader technology overhaul at HMRC. In March, the agency awarded Amazon Web Services a £472.8 million contract to migrate and host services from three Fujitsu run datacenters. That deal drew criticism from the House of Commons Science, Innovation and Technology Committee, which in a June 3 report cited it as an example of vendor lock in, noting that the procurement was designed so that only AWS or Microsoft could realistically win.

• Contract value: £600 million including VAT, up to 10 years duration.
• 13 bids received; CGI also shortlisted.
• Subcontractors: Route 101 (contact center tech) and Nice Systems (customer experience).
• HMRC's procurement pipeline in January included plans to spend more than £2 billion over two years.

CRM delay raises questions

HMRC's £2.4 billion, 15 year contract for customer relationship management software was originally scheduled for award and start on 1 May 2026. In an update published last week, both dates were pushed to 1 August 2026. An HMRC spokesperson said the timelines are kept under review and that the delay has no impact on customer services.

The delay comes as HMRC faces scrutiny over its reliance on a small number of large suppliers. The Science and Technology Committee report warned that dependence on AWS and Microsoft undermines competition and value for money. Capgemini's new contract, while smaller, further concentrates HMRC's IT spending among a handful of global firms. The tax authority has not indicated whether the CRM delay will affect other procurement timelines.