Lot selection is a strategy, not a formality

A framework opens with six lots. The instinct is to tick all six, more chances to win, surely. In practice it is one of the most reliable ways to end up on a framework and never receive a referral.

What ticking every lot signals

Evaluators read your lot selection as a statement about your operation. A provider bidding for domiciliary care, supported living, complex needs, live-in, children's services and reablement across three geographic zones is telling the panel one of two things: either you are a large organisation with genuine depth in all six, or you have not thought about it.

If your answers are then written generically enough to cover all six, the panel concludes the second. Specificity is what scores, and specificity is impossible when one answer has to serve six different service models.

The ranking problem nobody explains

On most ranked frameworks, referrals flow down the list in order. Position matters enormously.

One of the letters in our files records a provider ranked 5th, 6th and 5th across three lots in fields of 42 to 52 bidders. That provider gets called. A provider admitted at position 38 of 44 on the same framework has a place on paper, a certificate for the wall, and almost no work.

Spreading effort across six lots reliably produces middling scores in all of them. Concentrating on two produces top-quartile scores in those two. The second outcome is worth more money.

Read the lot rules before you choose

The rules in the tender documents can change your choice more than the lot descriptions do. Under the Procurement Act 2023, which covers procurements started on or after 24 February 2025, buyers must consider splitting a contract into lots and give reasons if they do not. They can also:

• limit the number of lots one supplier can bid for;
• limit the number of lots one supplier can win, in which case the tender notice or documents must say how they will decide which lots you are awarded;
• offer to combine lots into a single contract if one supplier wins several.

A cap on awards changes the calculation. If you can win only two lots, a strong answer on a third may never be used, and the buyer's decision rule, not your preference, may decide which two you keep. Read that rule before you decide where your best writing goes.

Know whether you can come back later

The cost of leaving a lot out depends on the type of agreement.

On a closed framework, the lot you skip is gone for years. On an open framework or dynamic market, you can apply once your evidence is stronger. That makes "concentrate now, add later" a cheaper strategy than it first looks.

How to choose

Four questions, in this order:

1. Can you mobilise it from day one? Not "could we recruit for it", can you staff the hours in that geography in week one. Frameworks penalise providers who accept and then decline referrals.
2. Do you have evidence specific to it? If you cannot point to outcomes, incidents handled, or a named specialist for that service model, your answers will be generic and score accordingly.
3. Does your registration cover it? Obvious, and still one of the most common eliminations. Your CQC registration must include the regulated activity and, often, the location.
4. What is the actual volume? Buyers usually publish indicative values per lot. A lot worth 4% of the framework is rarely worth diluting your submission for.

A worked lot decision

An illustrative example: a domiciliary care provider looking at a county framework with five lots, scored against the four questions above.

The result is one firm bid, one conditional bid and three lots left alone. The north zone answers can now be written with named staff, real travel times and local outcomes. Before committing to Lot 2, check whether the agreement reopens. If it does, entering the north now and the south next time may beat a thin bid on both.

A real example

One of our clients bid a London borough's Independent Living Support Service framework across four lots. The submission succeeded on Lot 4, Domestic Care, and was unsuccessful on the other three.

That is a good outcome, not a bad one. The domestic care answers were specific, evidenced and matched a service the provider genuinely ran at scale. The other three were adjacent services where the evidence was thinner, and the panel could tell.

Had all four been written to the same standard as Lot 4, the effort would have gone into strengthening one lot rather than diluting four.

When bidding widely is right

Two exceptions. On unranked open frameworks and dynamic purchasing systems where admission is pass/fail and referrals are allocated by rotation or need, breadth costs you little. And where lots share a single set of quality answers, some frameworks score once and apply the result across all lots: the calculation changes entirely.

What to do before you tick any boxes

1. Find the award mechanism, any lot caps and any combined-lot option in the tender documents. Put them on one page.
2. List the postcodes in each geographic lot and compare them with where your staff live today.
3. Check your Care Quality Commission (CQC) registration against the regulated activity each lot needs.
4. Record whether the agreement is closed, open or dynamic, and when it next reopens.
5. Decide lot by lot at your bid or no-bid meeting, not all at once, and write down why.

Our free tender fit check is a quick first test for a single opportunity, and our frameworks and DPS page explains how these routes to market work.

If you want a view on which lots are worth your effort, that's what the bid/no-bid review is for, and it happens before you pay for any writing.

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