Supplying to us (Commercial)

 

Our Approach

We implement best practice in line with the requirements of the Cabinet Office, focusing on achieving value for money, transparency and ensuring the fair and equitable treatment of suppliers. Our team holds certification from the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply.

 

NEW in 2025: Legislation governing our procurement activities and sourcing is changing!

The Procurement Act 2023

On 24 February 2025, the rules that shape how public bodies, including the Met Office, buy goods and services will change. The Procurement Act 2023 will improve and streamline the way procurement is done and benefit prospective suppliers of all sizes, particularly small businesses, start-ups and social enterprises, as well as introducing additional benefits including more standardisation, streamlined procurement processes; and strengthening of payment terms.

If your business supplies goods, works or services to organisations in the public or utility sectors, including the Met Office - or hopes to do so in the future – you need to know about the changes.

More Flexibility

The new Act will:

• Simplify the bidding processes to make it easier to bid, negotiate and work in partnership with the public sector – including a new ‘competitive flexible’ procedure.
• Make commercial frameworks more open, so prospective suppliers are not shut out for long periods of time.
• Remove bureaucratic barriers for smaller businesses and VCSEs so they can compete for more contracts – with strengthened provisions for prompt payment throughout the supply chain, enabling you to benefit from 30-day payment terms on a broader range of public sector contracts.
• Require public bodies to provide consistent feedback for suppliers: a requirement on public bodies to provide bid assessments for final tenders.

What you need to do to get ready

Familiarise yourself and your colleagues with the Act – check out all the summary documents and videos on the Transforming Public Procurement supplier page which provides further information about the new regime and the learning and development, guidance and support that Cabinet Office is providing.

A series of supplier Knowledge Drop videos (details below) have been developed to give you a broad understanding of the Procurement Act 2023 and the key changes.  

Knowledge Drops and Get Ready Webinars

A series of Knowledge Drops, designed to provide an overview of the Procurement Act 2023, have been developed. They are aimed at suppliers who deliver contracts to the UK public, utilities and defence sectors, who take part in competitive procurements or have delivered contracts under the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 (the set of rules followed by most contracting authorities), the Utilities Contracts Regulations 2016, the Defence and Security Public Contracts Regulations 2011, and the Concession Contracts Regulations 2016, or new entrants who would like to do so in the future.

They are designed to explain the key changes to the previous regulations, and how this may influence how you do business with the UK public, including the Met Office, utilities or defence sectors accordingly. 

Get Ready Webinars

To support readiness for the new regime, Cabinet Office are running two webinars for suppliers and other external organisations. These sessions will focus primarily on what the key changes are, how the central digital platform will work (featuring a live demonstration), and will be an opportunity to ask questions on your own preparations for go-live.

You can book your place using the links below:

Thursday, 23 January 2025 (10.30-11.30)

Friday, 24 January 2025 (11.00-12.00)

The webinars will be recorded and will be available on the gov.uk suppliers page at the end of January 2025.

Where to find more information

There are dedicated guidance products to help you prepare and to support you as you begin to do business under the new regime:

A short guide for suppliers on the main elements of the Procurement Act 2023;

A factsheet explaining how the  Central Digital Platform will work;

Dedicated Supplier Knowledge Drops giving you an overview of the key changes with versions for SMEs and VCSEs;

Supplementary Guidance explaining how Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises are defined; and

A Public sector buyers’ training manual, to see the detailed training all procurement practitioners are undertaking.

 

Future Tender Opportunities

The Met Office Pipeline provides a forward look at our anticipated procurement activity over the next 12 months.

Where possible, we have included all our major projects and anticipated procurements. Neither the publication of this pipeline, nor any of the information presented in it should be taken as:

• a commitment
• or representation

on the part of the Met Office to enter into a contractual arrangement or to proceed with a procurement.

Circumstances may change and we cannot guarantee that the requirements, contract value, and/or timeline will be as stated. There may also be further procurement activity that takes place that we are not currently aware of and which may therefore not appear on this Commercial Pipeline and some opportunities could be purchased through government frameworks.

Met Office Pipeline - November 2023

To view details of our current procurement activity, please visit our our eTendering Opportunities Portal ProActis.