Glossary

We understand that procurement can be confusing. Organisations often use different terms to describe the same thing. With that in mind, we designed this glossary to make buying with us and navigating our website easier. It is not designed to be an extensive list of all procurement terms.



Containing

D

Direct award under PCR2015

Under Public Contracts Regulations 2015, a Direct Award is where you place an order directly with a supplier without running a further competition.

The option to direct award is not available on all commercial agreements or to all organisations.

You should check the agreements buyer guide and your organisation’s policy to see if direct award is a compliant route and, if so, how to proceed.

Find out more about direct award.

This is replaced by Award without Competition under the Procurement Act 2023.

Direct award under PA2023

Under Procurement Act 2023, direct award is the term used for when a public contract is awarded without a competitive tendering procedure and the public contract is placed directly with the supplier of the contracting authority’s choosing.

A contracting authority may only directly award a public contract when section 41 (and one or more of the justifications in Schedule 5), section 42 or section 43 apply, and a transparency notice must be published before a contract is directly awarded.

R

RFP direct award

Where there is only one supplier on the framework, or if there is an option for the direct award in the commercial agreement guidance notes, you can place an order directly with the supplier. RFP direct award allows buyers to select a single supplier in which they would like to engage with to receive their proposal before progressing to the contract award.

If there are multiple suppliers who can meet the buyer’s needs, direct award can only be awarded if cost is the only factor.