Official UK procurement notice
Holiday Activities and Food (HAF) Programme: Preliminary Market Engagement.
Authority: Swindon Borough Council (Local council)
What is being bought
Published requirement descriptionSwindon Borough Council is planning to tender to the supplier market, seeking to award a framework contract to a range of suppliers to deliver the Holiday Activities and Food Programme (HAF) on behalf of the local authority. The purpose of this is to support Swindon Borough Council in enabling eligible children and young people to access activity. The framework suppliers will be responsible for supporting children eligible for the service, ensuring that children and young people in Swindon have access to high-quality activity provision that includes a nutritious meal at every session.
The supplier must deliver high quality activity provision that meets the HAF Standards (as per the Department for Education’s requirements). The HAF programme has provided national support to children in receipt of benefits-related free school meals through holiday periods. The HAF Programme supports eligible families to overcome financial and time pressures, by using grant funding to fund places with activity providers, to enable eligible children and young people to attend activities in the Spring, Summer and Winter school term holidays. Swindon Borough Council is interested in receiving tenders to deliver the HAF service. All delivery under this framework must take place in Swindon.
The intention is that Swindon Borough Council will go to market to award an initial 2.5-year contract, with an option to extend for a further 1-year period.
In preparation for this, please find enclosed our Preliminary Market Engagement questions to review the current supply market. The same information will be requested from a number of Suppliers, who wish to participate to assist the Council with the specification/tender preparations.
Any contracts for services relating to this exercise shall be subject to separate procurement processes in accordance with the Procurement Act 2023. All participants in this event shall be responsible for their own costs (including third party costs) and the Contracting Authority shall have no liability to any participant.
The purpose of this questionnaire is to gain intelligence on the supply market for Swindon Borough Council’s Specification requirements, including information that will help define the most appropriate Specification aligned to the Councils budget. The attached Specification is a first draft and outlines our Specification Requirements. If there are any components in Specification that would prevent your company from bidding, please advise. The closing date for the return of the Suppliers response to the Councils Pre Market Engagement Questions is 15/05/26.
CPV: Child daycare services · Children's holiday-camp services · Community action programme · Entertainment services · Physical well-being services · Sport-related services
The lotProcurement structure
single lot · no lot value publishedPipeline intelligence · planning stage: how this market runs before the tender is published
How Swindon Borough Council buys Holiday centre and holiday home services (CPV 5524), and who usually turns up
Swindon Borough Council’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: Holiday centre and holiday home services (CPV 5524) →
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 outside 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 77 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 bid15% / 21%
2–318% / 21%
4–632% / 0%
7+35% / 57%
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 estimate54% / 20%
Within ±2%25% / 60%
Above estimate21% / 20%
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 8531Estimate not published
This lot is listed as CPV 8531. 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 49 past lots.
A forecast, not a list of bidders.
1 bid22%
2–339%
4–627%
7+12%
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
- 29 Apr 2026, 12:17 BST
- Last source update
- 29 Apr 2026, 12:17 BST
- Authority reference
1- FTS notice number
2026/S 000-039126- Latest notice
- Preliminary market engagement notice (UK2)
- Classification (CPV)
- Delivery area
- Official registry OCID
ocds-h6vhtk-068ddeFind a Tender
How it was run
Official notice- Submission deadline
- —
Timeline
29 Apr 2026 → 1 Dec 2026 · 3 dates- Planning notice published178 days ago29 Apr 2026, 12:17 BST
- Market engagement162 days ago15 May 2026, 23:59 BST
Engagement Process Description
To participate in the Preliminary Market Engagement Suppliers will need to Register as a Supplier with ProContract, www.supplyingthesouthwest.org.uk ↗, then Register an Interest before obtaining access to the Preliminary Market Engagement documents.
Responses to the Preliminary Market Engagement Questionnaire are required to be submitted no later than 15th May 2026, 17:00 hrs UK Local time via ProContract tender portal - www.supplyingthesouthwest.org.uk ↗
Project Reference Number: DN814493
- Today24 Oct 2026
- Contract startsin 37 days1 Dec 2026
Notice history
1 event · 1 release on Find a Tender- Preliminary market engagement notice published29 Apr 2026, 12:17 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