Registering on the Central Supplier Database (CSD)

The Central Supplier Database (CSD) is National Treasury's single database of suppliers to the state. National Treasury requires a supplier to be registered on it before an award letter, purchase order or signed contract is issued, and for an open tender before the bid is submitted.

It applies to national and provincial departments and public entities, and it has applied to municipalities and municipal entities since 1 July 2016. Purchases through petty cash, sundry payments and foreign suppliers with no locally registered entity are exempt.

You register online at secure.csd.gov.za. National Treasury's supplier leaflet lists four things as mandatory:

The registration process also covers your business's registration number (a company or trust number where you have one), tax details, directors or members, and B-BBEE information. National Treasury stated in June 2016 that registration on the CSD is free of charge.

The CSD checks what you capture against other government records, including your tax compliance status, identity number, B-BBEE status level and whether you are listed as a tender defaulter or restricted supplier. It verifies details with institutions such as SARS, the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission (CIPC) and the Department of Home Affairs, and bank verification can take up to four days.

Your registration is complete once your supplier information has been given a supplier number.

National Treasury asks suppliers to keep their details up to date and to confirm at least once a year that they are still current. On the standard invitation to bid (SBD 1), a bidder without a SARS tax compliance PIN gives its CSD supplier number instead, so keep the number to hand.

Organs of state can also invite requests for quotation through the CSD itself. National Treasury's 2026 fact sheet for suppliers explains that an invited supplier sees genuine RFQs under the My RFQ menu on the CSD, downloads the documents and submits its quotation there, and that the CSD does not send links.

During evaluation the CSD shows compliance indicators — among them tax, restricted supplier or director, government employee, proof of address, bank details and ownership — and the fact sheet states that RFQs will not be awarded to non-compliant suppliers. A supplier with a red flag for proof of address, government employee, restricted supplier, restricted director or ownership cannot submit a quotation at all, which is one more reason to keep your record right.

Govermate lists open tenders and requests for quotation from government departments, municipalities and public entities by province, with their recorded closing dates. Complete your CSD registration before you find the one you want to respond to, not on the day it closes.