About OPSS

Do you care about the safety of products and want to protect people and places? Can we use your skills, knowledge, and experience to enable UK business to thrive? If the answer is yes, then we would like to hear from you!

We are the Office for Product Safety and Standards (OPSS), part of the Department for Business & Trade. We are here for the purpose of making regulation work to deliver real world impact. Regulation is a powerful Government tool to address market failures, influence behaviour and promote positive action. Crafted and delivered well, regulation can be an enabler of growth, innovation, and efficiency.

Since early 2018 we have been building a positive and creative team that enjoys a position of influence and respect within an organisation that continues to grow, most recently with the addition of construction products regulation planned.

Our primary purpose is to protect people and places from product-related harm, ensuring consumers and businesses can buy and sell products with confidence.

Further information can be found on our website here

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles. We embrace diversity and promote equality of opportunity. We are committed to building a team that represents a variety of backgrounds, perspectives, and skills. There is a guaranteed interview scheme (DCS) for people with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.

The Online and Supply Chain Enforcement Team regulates the full supply chain, from ports and borders through to online marketplaces, fulfilment houses and third-party sellers. We are responsible for ensuring that shopping online will be as safe as shopping on the high street. 

To achieve this crucial mission, we have established two key enforcement teams: Ports and Borders, and Online Enforcement. We are currently seeking experienced professionals to fill Senior Enforcement Officer roles within both teams.

​Ports and Borders Enforcement Team 

No two days are the same, working in the Ports & Borders Team. We are committed to preventing unsafe and non-compliant products entering the UK supply chain.

Our team delivers a programme of activity in which we look for innovative ways of finding the right intervention points to stop bad actors within the supply chain. This can include deployments a ports, proactively monitoring fulfilment centres and inland activity, and targeting resources to deal with prolific offenders. We work with a range of regulators including Local Authorities, Border Force, and HMRC.  

As a Senior Enforcement Officer, you will Lead on Ports and Inland deployments, conducting a range of onsite activities throughout the UK, ensuring Officers follow best practice.

You will use initiative and be proactive in establishing a programme of regulatory activity, and lead on a range of high profile or challenging workstreams, compiling accurate project reports, operational plans, and case files, including if appropriate carrying out detailed investigations to determine the appropriate enforcement action and/or sanctions.

You will be at the forefront of building relationships internally and externally and will play a key role in developing, and mentoring Enforcement Officers. 

Online Enforcement 

The Online Enforcement team works in a fast-paced, dynamic environment, proactively ensuring that products sold from online market places and platforms are safe for UK consumers.

The team is intelligence and data driven conducting test purchases of high risk products sold online. We work collaboratively with other OPSS teams, and provide resource when national product safety incidents occur.

The team is involved in a range of enforcement activities including withdrawing and recalling products from sale and investigating and taking proportionate enforcement action, including prosecution. This work feeds into new regulatory strategies and approaches, holding the online sector to account for the products they sell. 

As an Senior Enforcement Officer in the Online Enforcement team you will have a portfolio of cases to manage. You will lead on projects and present your findings to senior managers and colleagues. Working at pace you will take decisive action, prioritising and making decisions that are risk based and proportionate.

You will lead enforcement activity and ensure that businesses remain compliant after interventions. You will develop and enhance enforcement skills, such as evidence handling, utilising statutory powers and recognising the need for accurate reporting, recording and production of case files.

In an evolving market you will develop an understanding of the online economy and the market it serves, allowing for innovative approaches to online regulation. 

Key Responsibilities

• Undertake both proactive and reactive enforcement work to ensure products placed on the UK market are compliant.  
• Take the lead on your own enforcement investigations, provide support to multi-officer investigations and supervise your teams casework.   
• Develop and build relationships with relevant professional and trade bodies in the regulated area.
• Provide guidance and support to businesses and business sectors to enable greater compliance within the industry.
• Develop specialist understanding and knowledge of the legislation you enforce, and the industries and sectors you regulate.  
• Undertake regulatory activities in accordance with the Regulators Code and OPSS Enforcement Policy.
• Actively build and maintain relationships across teams within Enforcement and across the office to identify opportunities to add value to your work, ensuring that our approach to regulation is consistent. 

If you have a preference to the team that you will be assigned to, and where possible this will be considered; however we reserve the right to offer wither post to the successful candidates; and our roles have the potential to be deployed to other teams should their be a business need or emerging risk priority.

We are keen to hear from people with varying backgrounds, who can demonstrate the following essential skills and experience: 

• Experience in an investigatory role in any of the following fields: regulation, enforcement, or compliance.
• Strategic problem-solving and analytical skills.  
• Ability to scope, plan, and guide the delivery of results-oriented, multifaceted work plans. 
• Flexibility and ability to clearly set priorities in what can be a changing environment
• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills.  
• Ability to research, understand assess and apply technical information, filtering, and prioritising data to assist in understanding its relevancy in the investigative process.   
• A full valid driving licence. If you do not hold a driving licence because of a protected characteristic, please speak to the recruitment manager to let them know, and this will be considered.

We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

• Changing and Improving
• Delivering at Pace
• Making Effective Decisions
• Working Together

• Learning and development tailored to your role
• An environment with flexible working options
• A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity
• A Civil Service pension with an average employer contribution of 27%

We recognise the challenges that people with (multiple) protected characteristics may experience on the job market and in their career progression. We are fully committed to being an inclusive employer and ensuring equal opportunities. We are keen to make our workforce as diverse as possible, and we hope to attract applications from underrepresented groups, including ethnic minorities, people with a disability, and people with gender diverse identities.

Please refer to the attached candidate pack for further information on our benefits.

Job contact :

• Name : Becky Allen
• Email : [email protected]

Recruitment team

• Email : [email protected]