Public procurement runs on acronyms, and the vocabulary has shifted recently — especially in the UK, where the Procurement Act 2023 renamed a lot of it. This glossary explains the terms a bidder actually needs, in plain English, and flags where the UK and Ireland/EU now diverge. Bookmark it; cross-references to fuller explainers are linked where useful.
Award and evaluation
MEAT (Most Economically Advantageous Tender) — the EU/Irish principle that contracts are awarded on the best balance of price and quality, not lowest price alone. (See the MEAT evaluation framework.)
MAT (Most Advantageous Tender) — the UK equivalent under the Procurement Act 2023, which dropped “economically” to let buyers weight quality, social value and innovation more freely relative to price.
Award criteria — the published factors, each with a weighting, against which bids are scored to decide the winner.
Weighting — the share of total marks a criterion carries. Your effort map: it tells you where the contract is won.
Standstill period — a mandatory pause (commonly 10 days) between notifying the award decision and signing the contract, giving unsuccessful bidders a window to challenge.
Assessment summary — under the UK Act, the feedback an authority must give a bidder explaining its scores, including how it could have scored higher.
Procedures and routes
Open procedure — a single-stage process with no restriction on who can tender; anyone who meets the requirements can submit. Used in both the UK and EU/Ireland.
Restricted procedure — (EU/Ireland) a two-stage process: a selection stage shortlists suppliers, who are then invited to tender. Replaced in the UK by the competitive flexible procedure.
Competitive flexible procedure — (UK, new) a bespoke, multi-stage procedure authorities design themselves, able to include dialogue, negotiation, demonstrations and down-selection.
Competitive dialogue — (EU/Ireland) a procedure for complex contracts where the solution is developed with bidders before final tenders. In the UK it’s no longer a distinct procedure but can be replicated within the competitive flexible procedure. (See competitive dialogue.)
Direct award — awarding a contract without competition, permitted only in tightly defined circumstances.
Routes to market
Framework agreement — an arrangement setting terms under which future contracts can be “called off.” A place doesn’t guarantee work. (See framework agreements.)
Call-off — an individual contract awarded under a framework, via direct award or mini-competition.
Open framework — (UK, new) a framework scheme that can run up to 8 years and reopens to new suppliers during its life.
Dynamic market — (UK, new) an open list of qualified suppliers, joinable at any time, for a wide range of goods, services and works; replaced the Dynamic Purchasing System.
Dynamic Purchasing System (DPS) — (EU/Ireland, and UK legacy) an electronic list of pre-qualified suppliers, historically limited to off-the-shelf purchases.
Documents and stages
PIN (Prior Information Notice) — an early signal that an authority intends to procure, often before the formal tender.
Contract notice / Tender notice — the formal advertisement that a live opportunity is open. The UK Act uses a single “tender notice.”
ITT (Invitation to Tender) — the document set inviting suppliers to submit bids.
SQ (Selection Questionnaire) — the supplier suitability/qualification stage (replaced the older “PQQ”, Pre-Qualification Questionnaire, in the UK).
ESPD (European Single Procurement Document) — a self-declaration of eligibility and standing used in EU/Irish procurement.
CPV codes (Common Procurement Vocabulary) — the EU classification codes that categorise what’s being procured; useful for finding relevant tenders.
CAN (Contract Award Notice) — the published notice confirming who won a contract — a valuable source of competitor and incumbency intelligence.
Lots — sub-divisions of a contract that can be bid for, and awarded, separately.
Where you find tenders
Find a Tender Service (FTS) — the UK’s portal, which replaced OJEU/TED after Brexit. Since 24 February 2025 it serves as the central digital platform, publishing above- and below-threshold UK notices (except below-threshold in Scotland) across the full contract lifecycle.
Contracts Finder — the UK portal for lower-value/below-threshold contracts in England.
eTenders — Ireland’s official portal, operated by the Office of Government Procurement (OGP).
TED (Tenders Electronic Daily) — the EU’s portal, the supplement to the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU), where above-threshold EU/Irish contracts are published.
Thresholds — the contract values above which full regulated procedures and advertising apply, set in line with the WTO Government Procurement Agreement and revised periodically.
Bodies and policy
Contracting authority — the public body running the procurement and awarding the contract.
OGP (Office of Government Procurement) — Ireland’s central procurement body, which runs eTenders and sets national policy.
CCS (Crown Commercial Service) — the UK’s central commercial body, operator of many major frameworks.
NPPS (National Procurement Policy Statement) — UK statutory guidance on procurement priorities that authorities must “have regard” to under the Act.
Social value — the wider economic, social and environmental benefit a contract delivers; a weighted, scored criterion (see social value scoring explained).
The takeaway
The vocabulary is the easy part — but getting it wrong, or missing that a term has changed in your jurisdiction, can cost you a compliant bid. Once the language is clear, the marks are won in how you write against the criteria. Start with how procurement panels actually score quality.
Know the terms — now win the marks. See how your live bid scores against the published criteria with BidReview’s free scorecard. Start free →
