Procurement Act 2023: What Changes on 1 April 2026?

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Procurement Act 2023: What Changes on 1 April 2026

From 1 April 2026, new transparency provisions under the Procurement Act 2023 come into force. These introduce payment reporting, supplier registration on the Central Digital Platform, and expanded publication of contract performance information. Together they complete the Act’s transparency framework from procurement to contract delivery.”

For procurement leads, contract managers, and suppliers delivering social value, the implications are significant.

This blog explains what’s changing, how the new rules connect to the contract KPI and transparency provisions already in force since January 2026, and what both commissioning authorities and suppliers need to do now to stay compliant and competitive.

Incoming Changes at a Glance

The Procurement Act 2023 has been coming into force in stages. The latest tranche of changes, brought in by the Commencement No. 4 Regulations 2025 and the draft Procurement (Amendment) Regulations 2026, includes:

• Contract payment information (section 70): Contracting authorities must now publish details of every payment over £30,000 made under public contracts, quarterly, on the Central Digital Platform (CDP). The first reports are due by 29 July 2026.
• Below-threshold supplier registration: Suppliers awarded below-threshold contracts must register on the CDP and obtain a unique identifier — improving visibility of SME and VCSE participation in public procurement for the first time.
• Contracts Finder replaced: The Central Digital Platform becomes the primary publication service for procurement notices, replacing the previous Contracts Finder publication route for new notices under the Act.
• Government Commercial Agency: Government has announced plans to consolidate Crown Commercial Service and Cabinet Office commercial capability into a single Government Commercial Agency overseeing more than £400bn in public sector spend.

These changes sit alongside two provisions already in force since 1 January 2026:

• Section 69 (payments compliance notices, confirming prompt payment performance every six months)
• Section 71 (contract performance notices, requiring annual publication of supplier performance against KPIs).

Together, the regime now covers the entire contract lifecycle.

What This Means for Commissioning Authorities

The Procurement Act introduced mandatory published KPIs for contracts worth £5 million or more. Under PPN 002 and PPN 026, authorities are encouraged to include at least one social value KPI in every contract, expressed where possible in terms of Standard Reporting Metrics (SRMs). Performance must be assessed at least annually and rated on a published scale from “Good” to “Inadequate”.

With section 71 now live and section 70 adding quarterly payment transparency from April, the practical consequence is clear: social value delivery is no longer an internal matter. It is in the public domain, linked to named contracts and named suppliers, and visible to audit bodies, the media, and Parliament.

For procurement and contract management teams, this means:

• Designing social value KPIs that are proportionate, measurable, and aligned to outcomes, using Preliminary Market Engagement to test what the market can realistically deliver
• Putting systems in place to track delivery against those KPIs with the same rigour applied to financial and operational performance. That means not relying on spreadsheets and manual returns
• Ensuring below-threshold contracts are captured too, since supplier registration on the CDP will for the first time make the scale of SME and VCSE participation measurable and reportable. This directly supports the government’s targets for increasing spend with smaller organisations

As procurement data provider Tussell has highlighted, over 8,000 live contracts worth £5m or more are now subject to these rules, with new eligible contracts being awarded daily. The volume alone makes manual approaches unsustainable.

What This Means for Suppliers

For suppliers in every sector, the new regime changes the stakes fundamentally. Social value commitments made at bid stage are now tracked, published, and consequential.

Under the contract performance notice regime:

• Performance against KPIs (including social value KPIs) is assessed and published at least annually
• Underperformance can trigger a Contract Performance Notice, setting out what went wrong and what the supplier did about it
• Published poor performance is a discretionary ground for exclusion from future procurements and can be referred to the Procurement Review Unit for potential debarment
• Conversely, a track record of “Good” ratings builds a public evidence base that strengthens future bids

For tech and professional services suppliers in particular, standard social value KPIs do not always map neatly onto the kinds of value these organisations create. The Social Value Model recognises this: authorities and suppliers can agree alternative metrics where no suitable SRM exists. But this flexibility depends on engaging early through Preliminary Market Engagement, something the new regime strongly encourages.

There is a silver lining, especially for SMEs and VCSEs. The below-threshold registration requirement means that smaller suppliers’ contribution to public procurement will be visible for the first time. Combined with the government’s published targets for SME and VCSE spend, and the Act’s provisions around lot-splitting and 30-day payment terms, this creates a genuinely more level playing field, provided smaller suppliers can demonstrate delivery against their commitments.

Managing Social Value KPIs Under the Procurement Act

The April 2026 changes complete the Procurement Act’s transparency architecture. Social value is no longer a bidding exercise that ends at contract award. It is a contract management discipline with public accountability built in.

The publication requirements under sections 70 and 71 introduce a practical challenge many organisations are only beginning to recognise. Once social value commitments become formal contract KPIs, authorities must collect delivery data, capture evidence, assess outcomes, and publish performance ratings in a consistent way across potentially hundreds of contracts.

Spreadsheets and manual reporting processes struggle to provide the audit trail required when contract performance notices, scrutiny, or supplier comparisons arise. Increasingly, both authorities and suppliers are moving toward structured digital systems that standardise social value metrics, evidence capture, and performance tracking across contracts.

Both commissioning authorities and suppliers need digital infrastructure that treats social value data with the same seriousness as financial and operational performance.

And that is what the Thrive platform is built to do.