Issue 5 · 27 October 2026

38 notices scanned · 5 worth your time

Five from 38 open notices — a thin week. In two of the five, getting on is a matter of clearing a quality bar rather than beating anyone on price. And one notice spent its first 25 minutes on Find a Tender describing a fire-damaged council house.

Leeds City Council for the Yorkshire Highway Alliance

Yorkshire Highway Alliance road markings framework 2026–28

Value: £7,200,000 ex VAT (£8,640,000 inc)
Term: 2 years + 2 — 14 Dec 2026 to 13 Dec 2030
Region: Yorkshire and the Humber — Leeds, Bradford, Calderdale, Kirklees, North Yorkshire, Wakefield, York
Closes: 19 Nov 2026, 12:00 · enquiries close 12 Nov, 12:00
Sector: Streetworks

Bid

Gate: Every tenderer that submits a compliant bid and scores at least 60% on each quality question is appointed. There is no cap on places. That makes the gate the quality threshold, question by question: one weak answer below 60% and you are out, however good the rest is. Submission is on Leeds' Jaggaer portal. Above threshold, open procedure.
Fit: A road marking contractor working in Yorkshire, for lining, re-lining and markings across seven highway authorities and any other council in the region that chooses to use it. The description is one line, so the scope, the volumes and the rate schedule are all in the ITT.
Scoring: The notice lists one award criterion, Quality, 'as per the Invitation to Tender', with no price weighting shown at all. With unlimited places, appointment is pass-or-fail on quality. Price will matter at call-off, by direct award or competition, not at appointment.
Price: There is a 1% supplier fee on what you are paid through the framework — last week's South West Wales framework charged nothing — so build it into your rates. The award decision is due on 24 November, five days after tenders close, so the council expects to mark quickly against a fixed bar.
Verdict: Bid. Unlimited places, appointment on a 60% quality bar and seven authorities able to call off. Write every quality answer to clear 60% on its own — one weak answer and you are out.

Newark and Sherwood District Council (via Nottinghamshire County Council)

Newark Market Place refurbishment

Value: £1,150,000 ex VAT (£1,380,000 inc)
Term: 15 months — 1 Feb 2027 to 28 Apr 2028
Region: Nottinghamshire — Newark
Closes: 27 Nov 2026, 12:00 · enquiries close 17 Nov, 17:00
Sector: Civils

Bid if

Gate: Two hard gates. The contract is reserved for bidders based in Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire or Lincolnshire, and a registered office is not enough: you have to show premises, staff or a depot actually operating in the area. And the site visit is mandatory — miss it and your tender is disqualified. Submission is on Source East Midlands, a new portal the councils are moving to. Below threshold, open competition, SME-suitable.
Fit: Replace the Market Place lighting, install pop-up power points, repair the existing porphyry setts, lay new York stone for an alfresco dining area, plus localised repairs. That is a public realm contractor with specialist paving and an electrician who can work in a live town centre. The first version of this notice, live for about 25 minutes, described the repair of a fire-damaged three-bedroom council house for Ashfield District Council. The corrected version is the one linked here.
Scoring: Quality 60, Price 40. In a market square, the method — phasing, access for traders and events, and how you lift and relay porphyry without wrecking it — is worth more than the number.
Price: £1.15m across fifteen months, which is a long programme for a square this size and suggests phasing around markets and events. Porphyry is hard to match, so price how many setts you will have to replace, not just how many you can lift and relay.
Verdict: Bid if you operate from Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire or Lincolnshire and have specialist natural stone paving on your record. Book the site visit first — without it you are disqualified.

Nottingham City Council

Highways traffic signals framework

Value: £2,000,000 ex VAT (£2,400,000 inc)
Term: 4 years — 1 Feb 2027 to 31 Jan 2031
Region: Nottinghamshire — Nottingham city
Closes: 3 Dec 2026, 12:00 · enquiries close 26 Nov, 12:00
Sector: Streetworks

Bid if

Gate: Up to three places, for the city council alone. No turnover, insurance or accreditation is published — the requirements sit in the contract specification. The notice was edited the same afternoon it went up to say the council is moving portals, from East Mids Tenders to Source East Midlands, so you need a fresh registration even if you have bid to Nottingham before. Below threshold, open competition, SME and VCSE-suitable.
Fit: A traffic signals installation and maintenance contractor within reach of Nottingham. £2m over four years shared between up to three firms is around £170k a firm a year if work is spread evenly — a steady supplementary contract, not a business on its own.
Scoring: Price 70, Quality 20, Social Value 10. And price keeps deciding after appointment: jobs up to £10k go by ranked order, and anything bigger is a direct award on a basket of goods. Every job is priced only from your rate schedule, so the rates you tender are the rates you work at for four years.
Price: With no mini-competition, your schedule of rates is your whole commercial position. Price it for the call-off mechanism: ranking first gets you the small jobs, and the basket of goods decides the big ones. Rates that are cheap on the basket items and expensive on everything else will be noticed.
Verdict: Bid if you install and maintain traffic signals around Nottingham and can hold a rate schedule for four years. Register on Source East Midlands now — your old East Mids Tenders login will not carry over.

Tayside Contracts

Subcontracting framework for works and associated services

Value: £17,200,000 ex VAT across 9 lots
Term: 3 years + 1
Region: Scotland — Dundee, Angus, Perth and Kinross
Closes: 26 Nov 2026, 12:00 — selection stage (SPD) only · invitations to tender expected 21 Dec
Sector: Civils

Bid if

Gate: Restricted procedure, so 26 November is the deadline for the Single Procurement Document, not the tender. Between three and ten firms per lot go through to price. You can be appointed to three lots at most, and to no more than two of the three civils lots. Documents are free on Public Contracts Scotland without registering.
Fit: Tayside Contracts delivers roads and other works for Dundee, Angus and Perth and Kinross, and this framework buys in subcontractors to top up its own workforce. There are nine lots: surfacing and patching, road markings and high friction surfacing, traffic management, landscaping and tree surgery, vehicle restraint systems, fencing, and civils in three tiers — over £250k, £75k to £250k, and under £75k. The bottom civils tier — kerbing, minor drainage, utility reinstatements, emergency works — is sized for a small local firm.
Scoring: Not published. Every lot says 'price is not the only award criterion' and leaves the weightings to the procurement documents, which only shortlisted firms receive at ITT stage. You are being shortlisted on your SPD before you know how you will be marked.
Price: No price is asked for until December. What decides whether you get that far is the SPD — your experience, your accounts and your capacity against Tayside's minimum selection criteria. And because you work alongside Tayside's own crews, your rates will be compared with what it costs them to do the job themselves.
Verdict: Bid if you work in Tayside and one of the nine lots is your core trade. Pick your three lots carefully, and put the effort into the SPD — only three to ten firms per lot get to price.

Karbon Homes

Byker district heat network

Value: £145m ex VAT (£174m inc)
Term: 41 years — 1 Jan 2027 to 31 Dec 2067
Region: Tyne and Wear — Byker, Newcastle
Closes: 20 Nov 2026, 12:00 · enquiries close 11 Nov, 17:00
Sector: Renewables

No bid

Gate: Design, build, finance, operate and maintain, as a 41-year concession. The bidder funds the scheme and recovers its investment through the tariff, which is why the cost criteria include the hurdle equity rate of return, the financial model and grant drawdown. Stage one is pass or fail, and only the highest-ranked bidder goes forward to a pre-construction agreement and the concession negotiation. This is an energy company's bid, with a funder behind it.
Fit: Decarbonise the heat network serving the Byker estate — Grade II* listed, around 80 hectares, occupied throughout — with 1,985 connections fed from the Walker Road energy centre and twelve substations. The firms that win this are heat network operators and investors. The opportunity for a contractor is the work underneath: pipework, plant room, substation and connection work, for whoever wins.
Scoring: Twelve criteria. Cost is 40% in six parts — tariff and landlord contribution 16, financial model 6, pre-construction contribution 5, delivery funding 5, equity return 4, grant drawdown 4. Quality is 60% in six parts, led by delivery in a live, occupied, listed estate at 12, and generation, storage, network and growth capacity at 12.
Price: There is no price in the usual sense. You are proposing a tariff the residents will pay for forty years and a return your investors will accept. Award is expected on 11 December, three weeks after tenders close.
Verdict: No bid unless you are a heat network operator with a funder. For contractors, the play is the winning consortium's supply chain once the preferred bidder is named in December.

Issue 5 · 27 October 2026

Yorkshire Highway Alliance road markings framework 2026–28

Newark Market Place refurbishment

Highways traffic signals framework

Subcontracting framework for works and associated services

Byker district heat network

Get it before the deadline, not after