Lots in public tenders and which to bid for

What a lot is

A lot is a part of a procurement that is awarded as its own contract. One tender can contain several lots, and one supplier can win more than one. Buyers commonly split work by type of service (say, cleaning in one lot and window cleaning in another), by geography (north and south of a county) or by size. The government's guidance on lots uses multi-site cleaning as its example: geographic lots can help small firms and make supply more resilient, even where a single national contract might offer economies of scale.

The buyer's duty to consider lots

Under section 18 of the Procurement Act 2023, before publishing a tender notice the buyer must consider whether the goods, services or works could reasonably be supplied under more than one contract, and whether those contracts could appropriately be awarded by lots. If both are true, it must either use lots or give its reasons for not doing so.

For most contracts those reasons go in the tender notice itself (light touch and utilities contracts have more flexibility). The Act does not list acceptable reasons. The guidance gives examples such as splitting the work raising the technical risk to delivery, or several suppliers making the contract disproportionately hard to manage. Reading the reasons is useful: if a buyer has decided against lots because it wants one supplier to manage everything, a partnership or subcontracting route may be your realistic way in.

This sits alongside a wider duty in section 12(4): buyers must have regard to the particular barriers small and medium-sized enterprises face and consider whether they can be removed or reduced. The section 18 duty applies to contracts above the procurement thresholds. For smaller regulated contracts below them, section 86 sets a similar duty to consider barriers for SMEs before inviting tenders, though it does not require lots. Our guide to the Procurement Act 2023 covers the wider changes.

Limits on how many lots you can bid for or win

A buyer has two separate levers, and it must tell you about either in advance:

• A cap on bids. A competitive tendering procedure may limit the number of lots any one supplier can submit a tender for (section 20(7)). The maximum must be in the tender notice.
• A cap on wins. When setting award criteria, the buyer may limit the number of lots any one supplier can be awarded, but it must then provide an objective way of choosing which lots a supplier gets if it would otherwise exceed the limit (section 23(4)). The maximum and that mechanism must be set out in the tender notice or tender documents.

A cap on wins changes your strategy. If you can win at most two lots, bidding for four costs you the effort of four bids for at most two contracts, and the tie-break rule may hand you the two you least wanted. Read the mechanism before you decide which lots to put the most work into.

Bidding for several lots, and combined awards

Award criteria are set for each lot, and each lot goes to the most advantageous tender for that lot. In practice that means each lot is scored on its own. If the questions are the same across lots, tailor the answers anyway: a method statement for a rural lot that talks about city-centre access will lose marks.

The tender notice must say whether the buyer will award multiple lots to the same supplier in accordance with criteria, and summarise those criteria (Procurement Regulations 2024, regulation 18(2)(p)). The guidance adds that a buyer wanting the option to combine several lots into a single contract, where one supplier wins them, must say so in the notice or documents. Some tenders also invite a price for a combination of lots, such as a discount if you win two neighbouring areas. Only offer one if the documents allow it, and make sure each single-lot price still stands on its own if you win just one.

How lots appear in a notice on Find a Tender

The tender notice is the place to start. Under regulation 18 of the Procurement Regulations 2024, where a contract is awarded by lots the notice gives, for each lot, so far as the buyer knows them:

Later notices follow the lots through. The contract award notice can cover several lots, and a lot the buyer decides not to award is recorded as a ceased lot. If a lot attracts no suitable tenders, the buyer may award that lot alone directly under section 43 while the other lots carry on (lots guidance). Use the tender finder to search live notices, and the tender glossary for the terms you meet in them.

Lots in framework agreements

Frameworks are commonly divided into lots, by type of work, value band or region. If a framework uses lots, the tender notice must include the estimated value of each lot where known, and the government's frameworks guidance says a published lot estimate cannot then be exceeded, unless the framework is lawfully modified. Getting onto the right lot matters more than getting onto the framework: call-off contracts are awarded under a particular lot, so a place on a lot you rarely use earns you nothing. See framework agreements for how call-offs work.

A worked example

These figures are illustrative. A county council tenders grounds maintenance in four geographic lots (North, South, East and West), each with an estimated value of around £150,000 a year. The notice says a supplier may bid for all four lots but be awarded no more than two, and that if a supplier comes top in more than two, it will be awarded the two lots where its score is furthest ahead of the next bidder.

You are a six-person firm based in the North, with your depot ten minutes from the lot boundary with East. Your turnover is £400,000.

1. North is your home ground: you know the sites, you have local references and travel costs are low. Bid, and put your best work here.
2. East is next door. Winning it would roughly double the work you do, so check whether you could recruit and equip a second team in time. If you can show how, bid; if not, leave it.
3. South and West are an hour away. Your prices would carry travel time your local rivals do not, and the cap means winning them could cost you North or East under the tie-break rule. Do not bid.

Two well-made bids beat four rushed ones. Our bid or no-bid guide and before you bid checklist help with the capacity and evidence questions, and writing a tender response covers the answers themselves.

Procurements still under the old rules

Procurements started under the Public Contracts Regulations 2015, and call-offs from frameworks set up under them, continue under those rules (Cabinet Office transparency guidance). Regulation 46 of the 2015 rules worked in a similar way: buyers could cap the lots one tenderer could win, set objective rules for allocating them, and combine lots only if the contract notice reserved that option.