DCD & Sons · Free weekly briefing

Bid or No Bid

A weekly read on UK tenders in utilities, streetworks, civils, telecoms, construction and renewables — including the ones you should not bid for.

Issue 6 ·

67 notices scanned · 6 worth your time

Six from 67 open notices. Two water companies are buying ten-year MEICA and operational technology frameworks in the same week, and both shortlist you before you see a price schedule. And Kirklees spent its first day on Find a Tender sending bidders to the wrong tender.

North Lincolnshire Council

Highways framework — civils, surface treatments and surfacing

Value
£90,000,000 ex VAT (£108,000,000 inc) across 3 lots
Term
2 years + up to 2 — 1 Apr 2027 to 31 Mar 2029, extendable to 31 Mar 2031
Region
North Lincolnshire, open to public bodies across Yorkshire and the Humber and Lincolnshire
Closes
30 Nov 2026, 12:00 · enquiries close 23 Nov, 12:00
Sector
Streetworks

Bid

Gate
Open procedure with no cap on places and no supplier fee. No turnover, insurance or accreditation levels are published in the notice — they are in the documents on North Lincolnshire's own portal, procure.northlincs.gov.uk. Marked as suitable for SMEs and VCSEs.
Fit
Three lots. Lot 1, civils, £27m: bridges and structures, drainage, highway construction, street lighting, traffic and safety schemes, barrier repairs, traffic signals and active travel. Lot 2, surface treatments, £27m: road recycling, surface dressing, micro asphalt, slurry sealing, high friction surfacing and retexturing. Lot 3, surfacing, £54m: reconstruction, plane and inlay, permanent patching and overlay. Any council, school, police force, NHS body, charity or parish council in Yorkshire and the Humber or Lincolnshire can call off, so the value is a ceiling, not a forecast.
Scoring
Cost 60, Quality 30, Social Value 10. Call-offs go with or without competition, under rules set out in the tender documents.
Price
With unlimited places, appointment is the easy part. The money comes at call-off, where your rates decide whether you get the work, so price the schedule you would be happy to work at for four years, not a number to get through the door. The initial term is only two years — treat the extension as a bonus, not something to recover costs over. Award is expected on 22 January.
Verdict
Bid. Unlimited places, no fee and two regions able to call off. Pick the lot that matches your plant and crews — surfacing is half the value.

Northumbrian Water

Low-complexity MEICA framework (FA08-32)

Value
£20,000,000 ex VAT (£24,000,000 inc) across 6 lots
Term
5 years + up to 5 — 14 Apr 2027 to 13 Apr 2032, extendable to 2037
Region
North East (Lots 1A–1C) and Essex (Lots 2A–2C)
Closes
25 Nov 2026, 12:00 — expression of interest by email · conditions of participation due 30 Nov, 12:00
Sector
Utilities

Bid if

Gate
The documents are not public. Email amp8procurement@nwl.co.uk with your full company name and the contact who will use the portal — name, job title, email and phone — and you get Ariba access within 48 hours. The expression of interest has to arrive by midday on 25 November, and the conditions of participation by midday on 30 November. The framework has no cap on places, but stage one shortlists the top eight per lot. Winners must also pass Northumbrian Water's CDM principal contractor competency assessment; fail it and the framework offer can be withdrawn.
Fit
A specialist MEICA contractor already working on water and wastewater treatment works, reservoirs and pumping stations. Six lots, by trade and area: mechanical, electrical, and complete design-and-build MEICA, each in the northern area and again in the southern area, which the notice lists as Essex. Jobs start at about £10,000 and most will be small and reactive — planned maintenance, out-of-hours cover and gang-in-a-van work. You manage the civils that come with them, and you build to CESWI and the company's own MEICA asset standards.
Scoring
Cost 50, Quality 50. Competitive flexible procedure in four stages: conditions of participation to cut to eight per lot, initial tenders, negotiation, then best and final offers. No supplier fee. Call-offs with or without competition, and the notice says bigger contracts go to firms that perform on the small ones.
Price
£20m across six lots and up to ten years is about £2m a year for the whole framework, shared between up to 48 firms. That is steady top-up work, not a programme. Price for small jobs: callout, mobilisation, out-of-hours and day rates for a gang in a van matter more than margin on a big scheme. Lot 2A reads £2m ex VAT and £24m inc — a typo; it is £2m.
Verdict
Bid if you are a MEICA contractor already working on water sites in the North East or Essex. Send the email well before 25 November — no email, no documents.

United Utilities

Operational technology build-only framework (PRO004917)

Value
£20,000,000 ex VAT (£24,000,000 inc)
Term
5 years + up to 5 — 1 Apr 2027 to 31 Mar 2032, extendable to 2037
Region
North West — United Utilities' operating area
Closes
30 Dec 2026, 00:00 — midnight at the end of 29 December · enquiries close 30 Nov, 00:00
Sector
Utilities

Bid if

Gate
Competitive flexible procedure under the utilities regime, on EU Supply. You start with a conditions of participation questionnaire: accounts showing financial standing, employers' liability, public liability and professional indemnity insurance, health, safety, environmental and quality systems, and references for comparable OT work within the last five years. The notice warns that a parent company guarantee or performance security may be required. Only shortlisted firms go on to the invitation to negotiate.
Fit
Installing, integrating, testing and commissioning operational technology — the control, instrumentation and telemetry kit — on treatment works, pumping stations and network assets. Build only, so the design is done by someone else. That suits ICA and control panel installers who already work on live water sites. Ignore the CPV list: it covers the whole installation family, from office computers to medical equipment, and none of it says anything about the work.
Scoring
Commercial 60, Technical 40, with negotiation before final tenders. Call-offs are competed between framework suppliers.
Price
Build only means pricing your labour and risk against somebody else's design. The money is lost at the interfaces: outage windows, permits to work and access on live operational sites, and design changes found on site. The enquiry window closes a month before tenders do — get your questions in during November. Award is expected on 26 February.
Verdict
Bid if you install and commission OT on live water sites and can show five years of comparable references. Plan to submit before Christmas — it closes at midnight on 29 December.

Lancashire County Council

Samlesbury Enterprise Zone — foul water drainage

Value
£2,000,000 ex VAT (£2,400,000 inc)
Term
9 months — 29 Jan 2027 to 31 Oct 2027
Region
Lancashire — Samlesbury Enterprise Zone, near Balderstone
Closes
27 Nov 2026, 12:00
Sector
Civils

Bid if

Gate
Below threshold, open competition, marked SME-suitable. No turnover or insurance levels are published. The documents are on the council's Oracle Fusion supplier portal, and the council's own listing says they are available until 12 noon on 21 October — a week before the notice was published on 29 October. That is almost certainly a typing error, but register now and email casprocurement@lancashire.gov.uk the same day if you cannot get in.
Fit
The Find a Tender notice is one line. The council's listing adds what it leaves out: finalising the design of the system, then building a new foul pumping station and rising main for the enterprise zone. That is a civils contractor with pumping station and rising main work on its record, and design capacity of its own or a named designer.
Scoring
Price 60, Quality 30, Social Value 10.
Price
£2m over nine months is about £220k a month. A pumping station and rising main is driven by the length of the main, the ground and the M&E package in the station, and if you are finishing the design, the design risk is yours too. Price it from the survey information in the documents, and qualify anything that is not there.
Verdict
Bid if you have built foul pumping stations and rising mains and can finish the design. Register on the council's portal today — its own listing shows the documents closing before the notice went up.

Kirklees Council

Highways materials and tools framework

Value
£1,800,000 ex VAT (£2,160,000 inc) over four years
Term
2 years + 2 — 18 Dec 2026 to 17 Dec 2030
Region
West Yorkshire — Kirklees
Closes
23 Nov 2026, 13:00 · enquiries close 13 Nov, 13:00
Sector
Streetworks

No bid

Gate
A goods framework, not works. Submission is on the YPO Atamis portal. The first version of the notice told bidders to look for KMCHS-466, Highways Structures Principal Inspections — a different tender. It was corrected the next morning to KMCHS-461. Use the corrected notice linked here.
Fit
Supply and delivery to the council's in-house highways teams: civils materials such as cement, drainage and ducting, manhole covers, gully grates, road marking materials and timber (Lot 1), site safety kit such as signs, cones, barriers, lamps and footway boards (Lot 2), and hand tools and consumables (Lot 3). That is a builders' merchant or a specialist supplier. The lot values add up to £450,000, which is the yearly figure: four years makes the £1.8m.
Scoring
Price 100%. Each order goes to the lowest total price from your price list; if you cannot supply, it goes to the next. Orders over £25,000 may be competed, again on price alone. Prices are fixed for the first year.
Price
A delivered-price list where lowest wins every order. Lots 2 and 3 are only £37,500 a year each, so price the delivery to depot carefully — on small orders, the delivery cost is what decides the ranking.
Verdict
No bid for contractors — this buys the materials Kirklees' own crews lay. If you are a merchant delivering in West Yorkshire, it is a straight price list, and the cheapest wins.

Wirral Council with Procure Partnerships

National developer framework

Value
£12,000,000,000 ex VAT across 63 lots
Term
4 years — 1 Apr 2027 to 31 Mar 2031
Region
England — all nine regions
Closes
8 Jan 2027, 12:00
Sector
Construction

No bid

Gate
Up to eight development partners per lot, across 36 development agreement lots and 27 joint venture lots, split by region and value band. You can take at most three neighbouring value bands per region for each lot type, and you need a contract example for every band you apply for. The appointed partner pays a 1.8% framework levy — on a development agreement, in full when it is signed. Submission is on The Chest.
Fit
Development partners who take on the whole development risk: land assembly, planning, design, procuring the supply chain and building it out, under forward funding, land-and-build or turnkey deals, or as a joint venture partner with the council. That is developers and contractor-developers with funding behind them, not contractors.
Scoring
Quality 70, in nine parts, led by finance and funding capability at 12 and delivery methodology or JV governance at 12. Commercial 30: pre-construction percentage 7.5, delivery percentage 7.5, developer's profit percentage 15. Accepting the framework terms is pass or fail. Supply chain management is scored at 6.
Price
There are no rates. You bid percentages — pre-construction, delivery and developer's profit — and a call-off can go by direct award to the lowest profit percentage. That is a balance-sheet decision, not an estimating one.
Verdict
No bid unless you are a developer that can fund and carry development risk. For contractors, the work comes through the appointed partners' supply chains once they start calling off.

Notices are taken from Find a Tender and Contracts Finder, both free and public. The assessment beside each one is our own opinion and is not procurement advice — always read the notice and the tender documents yourself before committing.

Need the submission written properly? That is what DCD & Sons does.

Issue 6 — 3 November 2026 — Bid or No Bid