UK Tender Notice Types Explained

UK tender notices are the numbered announcements (UK1 to UK17) that public sector buyers must publish at each stage of a contract's life under the Procurement Act 2023. UK4 is the tender notice itself, the one everyone watches. The other sixteen are where the real advantage sits, because they tell you what's coming, who holds the contract now, how well they're performing, and whether the buyer pays on time.

Most suppliers learn exactly one notice type: UK4, the tender notice. It's the one that says "here's an opportunity, here's the deadline, go". Fair enough. But if UK4 is the first you hear of a contract, you're already competing against firms who saw it coming six months ago and have been talking to the buyer ever since.

This guide runs through all seventeen notice types, what each one actually tells you, and which handful genuinely change your win rate.

Why the UK has numbered notice types now

The Procurement Act 2023 went live for new procurements on 24 February 2025, replacing the old Public Contracts Regulations 2015 regime. One of its biggest practical changes was replacing the old EU-derived form numbers (F01, F02, F03 and friends) with a UK-specific set running UK1 to UK17.

The point was transparency across the whole contract lifecycle, not just the moment of advertising. Under the old rules, you found out about a contract when it was tendered and heard nothing afterwards. Under the new regime, buyers publish notices before the procurement starts, during it, at award, and throughout delivery, including how the supplier is performing and whether they're being paid on time.

For suppliers who know how to read them, that's a significant intelligence upgrade. Most don't, which is the opportunity.

The pre-procurement notices: UK1, UK2, UK3

These are your early warning system. They exist before there's anything to bid for, which is exactly why they matter.

UK1 pipeline notice. Published between 1 April and 26 May each year by contracting authorities expecting to spend £100 million or more that financial year. It lists contracts worth over £2 million that they plan to advertise in the next 18 months. If you sell into large buyers, this is a free 18 month forward view of their spending intentions, published annually, and almost nobody reads it.

UK2 preliminary market engagement notice. Published when a buyer wants to talk to the market before writing their specification, or afterwards to report what happened. This is the single most underused notice type in UK procurement. Responding to a UK2 puts you in the room while the requirement is still being shaped. For above-threshold contracts, buyers who skip preliminary market engagement have to explain why in the eventual tender notice, so these are becoming more common.

UK3 planned procurement notice. Optional, and published to warn the market that a tender is coming. There's a mechanic here worth knowing: if a buyer publishes a UK3 between 40 days and one year before the linked UK4, they can cut the minimum tendering period to just 10 days. So a UK3 is both a heads-up and a warning that when the tender lands, you may have a fortnight rather than a month.

The procurement notices: UK4, UK5, UK6, UK7, UK12

This is the competitive phase, from advertising to signature.

UK4 tender notice. The main event. Used to advertise a competitive procurement, whether that's the open procedure or the competitive flexible procedure, and used both above and below threshold. Above threshold, the standard minimum tendering period is 25 days where electronic submission is allowed and all documents are published with the notice. Below threshold, a UK4 must be published before the contract is advertised anywhere else, which is useful to know if you spot a contract on a buyer's own portal and want to check it's been properly advertised.

Every UK4 carries at least one CPV code classifying what's being bought, which is how most suppliers filter their alerts. If you're not certain which codes cover your work, our free CPV code finder maps your services to the codes buyers actually use, including the ones they reach for instead of the obvious choice.

UK5 transparency notice. Published when a buyer intends to award a contract directly, with no competition. Reading these is uncomfortable and instructive in equal measure. If a buyer in your sector keeps direct awarding work you could have delivered, that's a relationship problem you can fix, and the notice tells you exactly who won and on what justification.

UK6 contract award notice. Published after the award decision but before signature. It starts the standstill period of at least eight working days, which is the window in which an aggrieved bidder can challenge. If you bid and lost, this is your clock.

UK7 contract details notice. Published after signature, generally within 30 days above threshold, and required for below-threshold contracts too. For contracts over £5 million, the actual contract document has to be attached within 90 days. Read that again: the signed contract, redacted but real, published for free. If you want to understand how a buyer structures deals in your sector, this is the best training material available anywhere.

UK12 procurement termination notice. Published when a procurement is cancelled and no contract will be signed. Sometimes the reason is bland ("to be replaced by a wider procurement"), sometimes it's gold. I've seen UK12 notices explaining that every bidder was disqualified for failing to submit the right documents, and that the buyer is now exploring other options. A cancelled procurement usually comes back. Knowing why it failed the first time is a genuine edge when it does.

The contract management notices: UK8, UK9, UK10, UK11, UK17

This is the group almost no supplier watches, and where the best intelligence lives.

UK8 contract payment notice. The newest one, and worth flagging because most guides published before 2026 don't mention it at all. Buyers must publish information about any single payment over £30,000 made under a public contract, quarterly, within 30 days of the quarter end. It applies to contracts where the procurement started on or after 1 April 2026, so volumes are still building. Over time it becomes a public record of who is actually getting paid what, and when.

UK9 contract performance notice. Published at least annually for contracts over £5 million, reporting the supplier's performance against at least three KPIs, using ratings such as good, approaching target, requires improvement and inadequate. It's also published to report breaches of contract and failures to improve. This is extraordinary. If you're planning to challenge an incumbent at re-tender, you can now read a public assessment of how badly they're doing.

UK10 contract change notice. Published before a contract's value or term is changed, or if it transfers due to corporate restructuring. Frequent changes on a contract usually mean the original specification was wrong, which tells you something about how the buyer scopes work.

UK11 contract termination notice. Published within 30 days of a contract ending, including when it ends perfectly normally. Combined with UK7, this is your re-procurement radar: you know what exists, what it's worth, and when it stops.

UK17 payments compliance notice. Published every six months, reporting statistics on how promptly that authority pays its suppliers. The first reporting period ran from 1 October 2025 to 31 March 2026, so the first real data landed in spring 2026. If you're a small business deciding whether a buyer is worth the working capital risk, you can now check their payment record before you bid rather than after.

The dynamic market notices: UK13, UK14, UK15, UK16

Dynamic markets replaced the old dynamic purchasing systems, and they run on their own notice set.

UK13 dynamic market intention notice announces that a market is being established and invites suppliers to apply. UK14 dynamic market establishment notice confirms it exists, names the suppliers admitted, and confirms buyers can start using it. UK15 dynamic market modification notice is published as suppliers are added or removed, which happens continuously. UK16 dynamic market cessation notice is published when the market closes.

The practical point: unlike old-style frameworks, dynamic markets stay open. UK14 and UK15 notices are your reminder that you can still apply to join something you missed the first time round.

The mistake most suppliers make

Watching UK4 only.

The Jonty team have spent years selling to the public sector and the pattern is always the same. A tender notice appears, everyone scrambles, and the contract goes to the firm that has been quietly talking to that buyer since the market engagement stage. The tender was never really a level competition. It was the last 25 days of a race that started a year earlier.

The notice types now give you a way to enter that race early, if you use them:

Work backwards from UK7 and UK11, not forwards from UK4. Contract details notices tell you what exists and when it expires. Termination notices confirm when it ends. That's your pipeline for next year, available today, for free.

Treat UK1 and UK2 as your business development calendar. Pipeline notices in April and May tell you what large buyers intend to buy. Market engagement notices tell you where you can influence a specification before it's written.

Use UK9 to target incumbents. A public record of underperformance on a £5 million contract is the most useful competitive intelligence a challenger can have.

Follow the OCID. Every notice in a single procurement carries the same procurement identifier, an OCID, linking pipeline through to termination. If you find one notice, you can find the whole story. Most suppliers don't know this exists.

Where these notices are published

New procurements under the Procurement Act publish to Find a Tender, which now operates as the UK's central digital platform and carries both above and below threshold notices. Procurements that started before 24 February 2025 continue under the old rules and their notices stay where they began, which for a lot of below-threshold English work means Contracts Finder.

Contracts Finder remains live and still carries a large volume of legacy and below-threshold activity, despite various commentary suggesting it has already been retired. Scotland runs its own regime through Public Contracts Scotland, and Wales and Northern Ireland have their own arrangements for devolved buyers.

Whichever portal a notice lands on, it'll be classified with CPV codes, and it's worth understanding how CPV codes work before you build alerts on them, because the classification is a lot less reliable than it looks.

So in practice you're still watching more than one place, and you're watching two regimes running in parallel. That fragmentation is exactly the problem Jonty exists to solve. Rather than asking you to monitor four portals and seventeen notice types, we read everything published and surface the notices that actually matter for your business, at whatever stage they appear.

Frequently asked questions

How many tender notice types are there under the Procurement Act 2023?

Seventeen, numbered UK1 to UK17. They cover the full contract lifecycle from pipeline planning through to termination and payment reporting. Not all apply to every procurement, and several have exemptions for private utilities, schools, light-touch contracts, or where devolved rules apply.

What is the difference between UK6 and UK7?

UK6, the contract award notice, is published after the award decision but before the contract is signed, and it starts the standstill period. UK7, the contract details notice, is published after signature and confirms the contract exists. If you bid and lost, UK6 is the one that starts your challenge window.

Which notice type should suppliers watch most closely?

UK4 if you want opportunities you can bid today. UK1, UK2 and UK3 if you want to shape opportunities before they're advertised. UK7 and UK11 if you want to build a pipeline of contracts coming up for re-procurement. Serious bidders watch all of them.

How do I find notices relevant to my business?

Notices are classified using CPV codes, the standard system for describing what a contract is buying, and most alert tools filter on them. The catch is that buyers apply them inconsistently, so a narrow code alert will miss contracts you could win. Use our free CPV code finder to identify the codes covering your services, then layer keyword searches and buyer tracking on top rather than relying on codes alone.

What is a UK8 notice?

A contract payment notice, reporting individual payments over £30,000 made under public contracts, published quarterly. It applies to contracts where the procurement began on or after 1 April 2026, so it's the newest notice type in circulation and still ramping up in volume.

Do below-threshold contracts use the same notice types?

Partly. A UK4 tender notice must be published before a below-threshold contract is advertised elsewhere, and a UK7 contract details notice is required after award. Other notice types can be used below threshold but generally aren't legally required, and exemptions apply for schools, concession and utilities contracts, and where Northern Irish rules apply.

What happened to F01, F02 and F03 notices?

Those were the notice forms under the old Public Contracts Regulations 2015 and related regimes, derived from EU standard forms. They still appear for procurements that started before 24 February 2025, because a procurement stays under the rules it began with. You'll see both sets in circulation for a while yet.

How long is the standstill period?

At least eight working days from publication of the UK6 contract award notice, where a standstill applies. The contract cannot be signed until it ends.