UNSPC

The United Nations Standard Products and Services Code® (UNSPSC®) provides an open, global multi-sector standard for efficient, accurate classification of products and services. The UNSPSC offers a single global classification system that can be used for:

• Company-wide visibility of spend analysis
• Cost-effective procurement optimization
• Full exploitation of electronic commerce capabilities

The United Nations Standard Products and Services Code is a hierarchical convention that is used to classify all products and services.

It is the most efficient, accurate and flexible classification system available today for achieving company-wide visibility of spend analysis, enabling procurement to deliver on cost-effectiveness demands and allowing full exploitation of electronic commerce capabilities. The UNSPSC was jointly developed by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Dun & Bradstreet Corporation (D & B) in 1998.

The UNSPSC is a hierarchical classification with five levels. These levels allow analysis by drilling down or rolling up to analyze expenditures. Each level in the hierarchy has its own unique number.

XX Segment The logical aggregation of families for analytical Purposes XX Family A commonly recognized group of inter-related commodity categories XX Class A group of commodities sharing common characteristics XX Commodity A group of substitutable products or services XX Business Function The function performed by an organization in support of the commodity

All UNSPSC entities are further identified with an 8-digit structured numeric code which both indicates its location in the taxonomy and uniquely classifies it. An additional 2-digit suffix indicates the business function identifier.

A structural view of the code set would look as follows:

Hierarchy Category Number and Name

For more information on UNSPSC, please visit http://www.unspsc.org