Procurement for public organisations: how to buy a website properly

The short answer

Public organisations buy websites and applications through procurement rules: thresholds decide the procedure, the procedure sets the steps, and evaluation criteria decide the winner. The rules are the frame; the outcome is decided by what goes inside it. A well-specified procurement names the non-negotiables as pass-or-fail requirements: accessibility to the referenced standard, ownership of code and data, open standards, documentation, exit terms, a security baseline, hosting in the organisation’s accounts. It evaluates on evidence rather than promises: a working sample tested for accessibility and speed, a hand-over pack from a previous client, named people, a maintenance plan with numbers. And it weights quality and five-year cost over initial price, because a bid is only lower on the lines it contains: hosting, maintenance, accessibility work and the hand-over arrive during the contract whether or not they were quoted. Check the specific rules for your organisation with your procurement and legal teams; what follows is what to put inside them.

Requirements: pass-or-fail versus evaluated

Pass-or-fail (non-negotiable)	Evaluated (weighted criteria)
Accessibility to the referenced standard, audited at acceptance	Quality of the proposed approach and design
Code in the organisation’s repository; data in open formats with export on demand	Evidence from previous work: samples, tests, references
Hosting and accounts in the organisation’s name	Maintenance plan: scope, cadence, response, monthly cost
Documentation to a defined standard; hand-over defined	Named team and their experience
Exit terms with cooperation	Five-year total cost, not build price
Security baseline and privacy by design with an assessment	Approach to content, migration and training
Open standards for data exchange and interfaces	Sustainability and performance practices

Running it well

After award

The contract includes what the requirements demanded: accessibility audited at acceptance, repository in the organisation’s account, documentation to the standard, accounts in the organisation’s name, maintenance with its report, exit with hand-over. The organisation verifies each at the defined moment rather than trusting the bid. A yearly check that a second supplier could take over from the documentation keeps the exit real.

What this means for you

Use the procurement rules as the frame and put the right things inside it: non-negotiables as pass-or-fail, outcomes as weighted criteria, evidence tested during evaluation, five-year cost over build price, and maintenance procured alongside. Verify ownership, accessibility and documentation at acceptance. A public website procured this way is one the organisation owns, can maintain and can hand to the next supplier, which is what the rules were written to achieve.