Cyber Essentials set to adopt tiered pricing structure

While micro businesses and organisations will continue to pay the current £300 assessment charge, small, medium and larger organisations will now be required to pay a little more on a sliding scale that aims to better reflect the complexity involved in assessing larger organisations.

Currently, all assessments are charged at £300. However, the bigger and more complex the organisation, the longer it takes to review and feedback on the assessment. The new structure – which adopts the internationally recognised definition for micro, small, medium and large enterprises – is as follows:

*Micro organisations (0-9 employees): £300 +VAT

*Small organisations (10-49 employees): £400 +VAT

*Medium organisations (50-249 employees): £450 +VAT

*Large organisations (250+ employees): £500 +VAT

Anne W, the NCSC’s head of commercial assurance services, commented: “This price change reflects the increasing levels of rigour that go into every assessment. While Cyber Essentials is designed to help any organisation attain a minimum level of cyber security, the assessment process can be quite complex. We want to continue to ensure this important scheme remains accessible to every business, no matter its size.”

As the cyber security landscape continues to evolve, so the NCSC continues to raise the bar, re-assessing and updating the scheme to ensure it remains relevant in the face of today’s cyber challenges.

Recently, the NCSC announced that it would be updating the requirements for Cyber Essentials in what will be the biggest overhaul of the scheme’s technical controls since its launch. The requirements update is also due to go live from 24 January, thereby coinciding with the price change.