United Kingdom · discovery → decision
When a notice match needs a memo (and when the digest is enough)
Facilities, cleaning and trades SMEs do not need a decision document on every Contracts Finder or Find a Tender hit. Most Monday matches only need a glance. This guide draws the line between a free or £19 digest match and a £9.99 / £29.99 bid/no-bid memo — without confusing either for bid writing.
Free weekly · £19/mo daily · £9.99 memo · £29.99 pack
The funnel in one sentence
Digest finds. Memo decides. You still write the bid (or hire someone who does). BidFit stops at the decision document.
When the free or £19 digest match is enough
The free weekly digest (up to three matches) and the £19/month daily upgrade exist so you stop living in six portal tabs. A match is enough when:
- The title, buyer, geography and value already tell you it is not your trade or not your travel-to-work.
- The clock is fine and the notice is an obvious open SME-scale lot you would open yourself anyway.
- You only needed a second pair of eyes that the notice exists — not a scored pass/fail against your insurance, turnover or hard no’s.
- You are still scanning official saved searches as source of truth and just want the Monday list shortened.
In those cases: open the notice, keep or discard, move on. Do not buy a memo to feel busy.
When a £9.99 public-notice memo helps
Buy the £9.99 product when the match survived the glance and the cost of a wrong bid is the real risk — a £699–£5,000 writer invoice, or a week of director time, on a contract you cannot win. Typical triggers:
- Geography looks close enough that you need a sourced fit score, not a gut feel.
- You want mandatory pass/fail from the published notice (SME flag, deadline, framework flag, stated accreditations) before you download the pack.
- You need an incumbent / last-award snapshot and a Companies House check of any named winner — or the DIY steps in find incumbent on Contracts Finder are not worth your time.
- Someone else in the firm will ask “why are we bidding this?” and you want a PDF with sources, not a Slack thread.
Pack-only gates — insurance limits, turnover multiples, TUPE, scoring weights — stay Unknown on the £9.99 memo. That is intentional. See the Bedford sample for format.
When the £29.99 pack memo is the right step
Upgrade to £29.99 only after you have the ITT / SQ pack and the decision still hinges on gates that live inside it. Forward the pack; the same memo structure fills pass/fail from the documents you send. It is still not a written bid, not SQ answers, and not portal registration.
If you have not opened the pack yet, stay on £9.99 — or stay on the digest.
A simple rule of thumb
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Match arrives (free weekly or £19 daily). Ten-minute triage: trade, region, clock, hard no’s.
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Discard or open. Most matches end here. No memo required.
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£9.99 memo when you need a sourced Go / No-go before bid-writing spend, from the public notice alone.
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£29.99 pack memo when pack gates must be filled and you will forward the ITT/SQ. Then you — or your writer — still write the bid if the verdict is Go.
What BidFit will not do at any step
- Not bid writing. No draft responses, no SQ completion, no “we’ll submit it for you”.
- Not a search engine. No dashboard of every UK notice, no “AI tender search”.
- Not a replacement for the portals. Keep Contracts Finder and Find a Tender alerts as source of truth.
Full price list: Prices. How a memo is built: How it works.
Questions
Is a digest match the same as a bid/no-bid memo?
No. The free weekly or £19 daily digest emails matching public notices for your trade and region. A memo is a separate optional product: a sourced Go / No-go decision document on one named notice URL. Neither is a written bid.
When is the free or £19 digest enough?
When you only need to know a notice exists and roughly fits your trade and geography. If you can open the notice, check the clock, and decide yourself in ten minutes, stay on the digest.
When should I buy the £9.99 or £29.99 memo?
Buy the £9.99 public-notice memo when you want a sourced fit score, pass/fail table, incumbent snapshot and plain Go / No-go before you spend bid-writing hours. Buy the £29.99 pack memo when pack-only gates must be filled from the ITT/SQ pack you forward.
Do you write bids?
No. BidFit does not write bids, complete SQs, or register you on buyer portals. Digests surface matches. Memos are decision documents. If the verdict is Go, you still need a bid writer — in-house or hired.
More guides
All BidFit guides: /guides/. Notice-visible vs pack-only: notice-visible gates vs pack-only gates. Notice triage: how to read a tender notice in ten minutes. Incumbent lookup: find incumbent / last award on Contracts Finder. Turnover gates: turnover requirements on notices. TUPE wording: TUPE wording cues on Contracts Finder. Portal setup: Contracts Finder + Find a Tender alerts without six tabs. Soft FM filter hygiene: Soft FM Contracts Finder filters. Product overview: free tender digest.
Start with discovery, not a writer invoice
Take the free weekly list. Upgrade to daily when Monday is too thin. Buy a memo only when a named notice needs a sourced decision.