Official UK procurement notice
Customer Engagement and Relationship Management
Authority: DFT Operator Limited 'DFTO' (Central government)
What is being bought
Published requirement descriptionDFT Operator Limited (DFTO) is undertaking preliminary market engagement to help inform the procurement strategy, contract scope and specification for a Customer Engagement and Relationship Management (CERM) Solution that will provide the shared capability needed to deliver a consistent, coordinated and personalised customer experience across GBR.
Emerging Scope
The proposed CERM solution encompasses the following key capability areas:
- Customer Engagement & Marketing Communications
Design, manage and deliver coordinated customer engagement and marketing communications across digital channels and customer lifecycle stages.
- Service & Journey Communications
Deliver timely, relevant rail service, journey and disruption-related communications before, during and after travel, across digital channels.
- Customer Support & Case Management
Manage customer enquiries, complaints, support interactions and case resolution consistently across customer service channels.
- Customer Data Activation & Personalisation
Consume, segment and activate customer data to support personalised engagement, communications and customer experiences.
- Foundation Customer Data Services
Maintain, manage and make available a trusted and unified view of customer identity, profiles, consent, preferences and related customer data across customer engagement and support services and the wider ecosystem.
These capability areas represent the current high-level scope and may be refined following market engagement.
Purpose of Preliminary Market Engagement
DFTO would like to understand what COTS SaaS cover one or more (or all) of the requirements including approach to systems integration to provide a seamless experience to GBR customers and staff and indicative costs to support the development of procurement methodology and business case.
DFTO is contemplating utilising suitable framework agreements as a potential route to market.
CPV: Database and operating software package · Document creation software package · Sales, marketing and business intelligence software package · Software integration consultancy services · Software package utilities · Software-related services · System and support services
The lotProcurement structure
single lot · no lot value publishedLot #1PlannedRenewal
Pipeline intelligence · planning stage: how this market runs before the tender is published
How DFT Operator Limited 'DFTO' buys Software-related services (CPV 7226), and who usually turns up
DFT Operator Limited 'DFTO'’s published record next to the market for the same work. Frameworks and DPS are left out: they draw different bid counts. Whole-market view: Software-related services (CPV 7226) →
How the contest usually goes
Winner shares use published awards; bid and price charts use contested lots.
i
How often small and medium firms win.
Share of awards where the winner’s size is known.
The counts under this question show how many awards have a known supplier size.
Small firms have won here. Neither number says whether you qualify; it describes who has been winning.
i
How often local firms win similar work.
Winners with a registered address in the delivery region, out of awards with a known address.
Local means the winner is registered in the region where that award was delivered.
A local branch does not count if the registered address is elsewhere.
Most of this buyer’s recorded winners were registered in the region where that award was delivered.
i
How long buyers here take to decide after bids close.
Middle value in days from the bid deadline to the award date, on competitions that published both.
Only decided tenders count, so slow ones still waiting are not in.
Half of these awards have an award date within 54 days of the bid deadline.
i
How often work is awarded with no recorded rival.
Direct awards and tenders where every published lot count shows one bid.
Both shares are minimums: some awards have no bid count.
Thin markets produce this too; it is not proof of a tailored specification.
Direct awards or one recorded bid are common here. Check the route before spending time on a bid.
How many bids did past lots attract?
i
How many bids past lots received.
Each colour is a bid-count range. Only competed lots with a published count are included.
Past bids do not predict this tender.
1 bid27%
2–331%
4–620%
7+22%
How did awards compare with estimates?
i
Where winning prices landed against estimates.
Each colour shows awards below, close to or above the published estimate, one lot at a time.
Past prices are a guide, not a bid price.
Below estimate58%
Within ±2%24%
Above estimate18%
Assess each lot i
What past awards tell you about each lot.
See the forecast, this buyer’s earlier suppliers and firms with relevant wins.
No supplier is confirmed as a bidder.
i
What past awards tell you about each lot.
See the forecast, this buyer’s earlier suppliers and firms with relevant wins.
No supplier is confirmed as a bidder.
Open a lot for its forecast, this buyer’s previous supplier and possible competitors, from published award history, not a bid list
Lot #1CPV 7222Estimate not published
This lot is listed as CPV 7222. The table above uses the notice category.
i
How many bids this lot may attract.
The forecast uses similar past competitions. The bar shows either that forecast or past bid counts; the line below says which.
Each lot shows its own forecast based on its own category; forecasts for different lots of the same notice are not comparative. The bar shows 135 past lots.
A forecast, not a list of bidders.
1 bid13%
2–333%
4–624%
7+30%
i
Where the award price may land.
The forecast uses similar awards and the buyer’s estimate. The band covers the middle half of likely prices.
No comparable awards for this lot yet.
A statistical guide from past awards, not a price to bid.
Who has supplied this buyer on similar work? i
Who has done similar work for this buyer.
Past contracts are matched by buyer, title and type of work.
A past supplier may not bid again.
i
Who has done similar work for this buyer.
Past contracts are matched by buyer, title and type of work.
A past supplier may not bid again.
No earlier contract of this buyer matches this lot on the published record.
Who could compete for this lot? i
Who could compete for this lot?
Firms with relevant past wins. On a framework, we show firms on that agreement.
None is confirmed as a bidder.
i
Who could compete for this lot?
Firms with relevant past wins. On a framework, we show firms on that agreement.
None is confirmed as a bidder.
Candidate suppliers for this notice have not been worked out yet, so this is not a verdict that nobody fits.
About this data
- Source. Official UK public procurement notices (Find a Tender), reused under the Open Government Licence v3.0. New notices arrive through the day; the figures are rebuilt nightly.
- Two views, kept apart. The authority’s own track record and the wider market for the same kind of work sit side by side and are never mixed. Where the local picture is too thin, a figure widens to a broader market and says which one it used.
- Forecasts are labelled. The price forecast and its range, possible competitors and the earlier-work matches are our estimates from past awards: not published facts, not win chances and not price advice. Official notices do not say who is bidding.
- Every figure shows what it rests on. Not every notice publishes a bid count, a value or a delivery region, so each figure carries the number of records behind it, and one built on few records is marked as such. The on a figure explains it; the counting rules are in the methodology. Spotted something wrong? Tell us.
Procedure terms & legal framework
From the official record- Legal basis
- UKPGA · 2023/54 Procurement Act 2023
- Procurement category
- Services
- Notice status
- Planned procurement
- Procurement threshold
- Above threshold (FTS publication)
- Regulatory regime
- Standard
- Commercial structure
- Stand-alone contract (no framework)
- Competition type
- Competitive procedure
- GPA / WTO covered
- Unspecified in notice
- Recurring procurement
- Unspecified in notice
- First published
- 22 Oct 2026, 14:38 BST
- Last source update
- 22 Oct 2026, 14:38 BST
- Authority reference
DFTO 139/26- FTS notice number
2026/S 000-100032- Latest notice
- Preliminary market engagement notice (UK2)
- Classification (CPV)
- Delivery area
- Official registry OCID
ocds-h6vhtk-078e07Find a Tender
How it was run
Official notice- Submission deadline
- —
Timeline
22 Oct 2026 → 1 Aug 2027 · 3 dates- Planning notice published3 days ago22 Oct 2026, 14:38 BST
- Today25 Oct 2026
- Market engagementin 24 days17 Nov 2026, 23:59 GMT
To facilitate market engagement, DFTO will hold a webinar for interested suppliers on 04/11/2026 at 11:00 GMT setting out the requirement and approach to procurement.
Please register your interest to attend by completing the form located at
forms.cloud.microsoft/e/RePj8T7kWr ↗
Following the webinar, you will be invited to respond to a questionnaire with your feedback by 17/11/2026
The purpose of this questionnaire is to understand market capability, delivery models, transition approaches, commercial structures and indicative costings, potential barriers to participation and any factors that may influence supplier interest or ability to bid.
Responses will be used to help shape the final procurement approach, tender documentation and contract requirements.
- Contract startsin 280 days1 Aug 2027
Notice history
1 event · 1 release on Find a Tender- Preliminary market engagement notice published22 Oct 2026, 14:38 BSTUK2
Commercial outcome & contract awards
Pipeline notice- Awards (0)
- No award published
- Contracts (0)
- No contract published
- Bid statistics
- No aggregate bid statistics published
Contracting authority & participating public bodies
Official documents & specifications (1)
Official links; attachments are not copiedNotices published for this procedure
- Preliminary market engagement notice Preliminary market engagement notice on Find a Tender