Guide · UK procurement policy
Social value in UK public tenders: what trade SMEs actually need to submit
Published 14 July 2026 · Sources linked throughout · This is a plain-English guide to published government policy, not legal or procurement advice.
1The short answer
Social value is scored on most public tenders now, and it's rarely a token gesture. Central government contracts must allocate a minimum 10% of the total evaluation score to social value under the PPN 002 Social Value Model (mandatory since 1 October 2025), and many local authorities apply similar or higher weightings of their own. In our analysis of 882 live UK notices, 42% were local-authority-led — for a trade SME, social value is very often the difference between a competitive score and a losing one on price and quality alone.
2Two different frameworks you'll meet — know which one you're answering
"Social value" isn't one scheme. Depending on who's buying, you'll typically meet one of these:
| Framework | Who uses it | How it's structured |
|---|---|---|
| PPN 002 Social Value Model | Central government departments, executive agencies, non-departmental public bodies (mandatory from 1 Oct 2025, replacing the earlier PPN 06/20 model) | Five national Missions and eight Outcomes, aligned to the National Procurement Policy Statement; minimum 10% of score |
| National TOMs (Themes, Outcomes, Measures) | Widely adopted by local councils, often via the Social Value Portal TOM System | Five themes (Jobs, Growth, Social, Environment, Innovation) covering 28 outcomes and ~147 measures, each with a published financial proxy value (e.g. an apprenticeship is costed, a volunteering hour is costed) so bids can be compared like-for-like |
Underneath both sits the Public Services (Social Value) Act 2012, which places a legal duty on public bodies — including local authorities — to consider economic, social and environmental well-being when procuring services. PPN 002 doesn't legally bind local authorities the way it binds central government, which is exactly why so many councils have adopted National TOMs or a close variant instead: it's their own way of discharging that 2012 duty with a measurable, comparable scoring model. Read your specific ITT's evaluation criteria before assuming which model applies — some authorities blend elements of both.
3Why this hits trade SMEs harder than it looks
Our analysis of 882 live UK tender notices found "social value" appearing in only 3 notices at the metadata level — almost invisible in the headline listing. That's not because it's rare; it's because, exactly like accreditation requirements (CHAS, Constructionline, SSIP, ISO), the actual social value question and its scoring weight live inside the SQ/ITT documents, not the notice you first see on a portal. A bidder who only reads the notice will miss it entirely — and then discover, reading the pack days before a deadline, that 15% of their score depends on a section they haven't drafted.
4What buyers actually want to see
| Do | Don't |
|---|---|
| Offer commitments proportionate to the contract's size and location — a £150k local repairs contract can credibly fund one local apprenticeship, not a national programme | Copy generic CSR language ("we care about our community") with no number, no timeframe, no measure attached |
| Quantify: number of apprenticeships/placements, hours volunteered, % of spend with local/SME subcontractors, specific environmental measures (e.g. fleet emissions, waste diversion) | Promise a commitment you haven't checked is operationally deliverable — evaluators score the plan, but the contract holds you to it |
| Back the commitment with a short method statement: who delivers it, by when, how it's reported | State a commitment as though it's already happening if it isn't yet true |
| Reuse a genuinely delivered commitment from a past contract as evidence you can repeat it | Claim past social value delivery you can't evidence if asked |
5How BidCrier Studio handles this
Studio treats every social value commitment exactly like every other claim in a tender: it must carry one of four classifications — evidence supplied · derived from evidence · confirmation required · unsupported, do not submit. If you've genuinely run an apprenticeship scheme before, that's evidence. If you haven't decided yet whether you can commit to one on this specific contract, that's flagged as confirmation required — never silently invented, never padded to hit a scoring weight.
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Always check your specific tender's ITT/SQ for the exact social value model, weighting and evaluation questions used — authorities vary in how they apply these frameworks, and some set their own local variants. This guide is general information, not legal or procurement advice.