Award Criteria (UK)

Award criteria are the scoring rules that determine which supplier wins a public contract competition. Under the Procurement Act 2023, they must be published in advance, connected to what is being bought, applied consistently, and communicated to unsuccessful bidders through an assessment summary after the competition. Getting award criteria right is one of the most important strategic tasks for any supplier entering a competition.

What are award criteria under the UK Procurement Act 2023?

Award criteria are the factors that a covered buyer uses to evaluate compliant tenders and identify the Most Advantageous Tender (MAT). The Act requires that award criteria must be published in the tender notice or the procurement documents before the competition opens, along with their relative weightings (expressed as percentages or ranges).

Award criteria must be connected to the subject matter of the contract: a buyer cannot award additional points for a supplier's general corporate social responsibility reputation if it is not relevant to the specific contract being awarded. However, the Act's broad MAT framework permits a wide range of qualitative, environmental, social, and public-interest criteria to be included, provided the connection to the contract subject matter is established.

Typical categories of award criteria include: price or cost (often assessed as whole-life cost); technical quality and methodology; workforce and delivery capability; social value (encouraged by the National Procurement Policy Statement); environmental performance and carbon commitments; and innovation and continuous improvement. The balance between price and quality criteria varies significantly by contract type, buyer policy, and the priorities set in the applicable policy statements.

Unlike selection criteria (which determine whether a supplier is capable of performing the contract), award criteria determine which of the capable suppliers offers the best tender. These are legally distinct stages and must not be conflated.

Why it matters for bidders

Award criteria tell you how to win. Reading the award criteria and their weightings before committing to a bid is the single most important analytical step in any bid decision. A contract with a 30% price / 70% quality split rewards narrative excellence and technical differentiation; a 70% price / 30% quality split rewards commercial discipline and cost efficiency.

Common mistakes include: spending equal resource on all criteria regardless of weighting; failing to answer the evaluation questions being asked (rather than the questions you prefer to answer); and under-investing in high-weighted criteria while providing comprehensive but low-scoring responses to smaller criteria.

Example

A government agency publishes award criteria for a digital consultancy contract: technical methodology 35%, team capability 25%, social value 15%, contract management approach 10%, and price 15%. A bidder that allocates its limited narrative resource evenly across all criteria will likely produce an under-resourced methodology section (the highest-weighted criterion) while over-investing in the price narrative (the lowest-weighted criterion). A strategically aware bidder allocates resource in proportion to the criteria weightings.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can award criteria be changed after the tender notice is published?

No. Material changes to award criteria or their weightings after the tender period opens are not permitted. They would disadvantage suppliers who shaped their bids around the original criteria. A buyer that needs to make material changes must typically withdraw the tender notice, issue a procurement termination notice, and re-run the competition.

Are weightings legally binding?

Yes. If a buyer publishes a 60% quality / 40% price weighting, it must apply those weightings when scoring bids. Departing from published weightings renders the award vulnerable to challenge, regardless of the buyer's intentions.

Must the buyer publish scores or just rankings?

The Act requires the buyer to provide an assessment summary to each unsuccessful bidder showing their scores against each criterion and the winning bidder's scores. This is more detailed than a simple ranking and gives unsuccessful bidders genuine insight into where and by how much they lost points.