Guide to the Procurement Act 2023
Overview
The Procurement Act 2023 applies from 24 February 2025. Contracting authorities and suppliers will need to follow new legislation to undertake public procurement for any new projects.
Previous regulations will continue to apply for:
- contracts that are already in progress
- projects started before the Procurement Act 2023 came into effect.
The National Procurement Policy Statement (NPPS) sets out the government's strategic policy priorities for public procurement.
What you need to do
For new procurement projects after 24 February 2025, it is important that you understand what’s changed. There are resources available to help you.
GOV.UK have information and guidance for suppliers about the changes.
You can also subscribe to the Cabinet Office mailing list to get regular updates.
Further resources:
- GOV.UK short guide for suppliers
- Transforming public procurement
- Central digital platform factsheet
- Supplier Registration Service
- Knowledge Drop videos for suppliers
- The Procurement Act 2023: A summary guide for suppliers
Using the Find a Tender service
The Find a Tender service (FTS) is the central digital platform for public procurement.
For suppliers:
- How to register your organisation and first administrator on Find a Tender
- How an administrator completes and updates supplier information
For buyers and suppliers:
Benefits to suppliers
A key objective for the Procurement Act 2023 is to make it easier for suppliers to do business with the public sector. The benefits are:
- a central place to register and to store your core business details so that they can be used for multiple bids
- improved transparency and access to information, with all public procurement opportunities in one place - making it easier to search for and set up alerts for procurement projects of interest to you
- better visibility of procurement plans, engagement events and tender opportunities - including those below threshold - increasing the number of opportunities available to bid on
- greater visibility about who is bidding for, and winning, larger public sector contracts above £5 million, and the details of those public contracts
- simplified bidding processes to make it easier to bid, negotiate and work in partnership with the public sector - including a new ‘competitive flexible’ procedure.
- frameworks will be more flexible, so prospective suppliers are not shut out for long periods of time.
- a new duty on contracting authorities to have regard to the particular barriers facing SMEs and VCSEs, and to consider what can be done to overcome them throughout the procurement life cycle, helping level the playing field for smaller businesses so they can compete for more contracts
- strengthened provisions for prompt payment throughout the supply chain - enabling SMEs to benefit from 30 day payment terms on a broader range of public sector contracts
- a stronger exclusions framework will take tougher action on underperforming suppliers
