1. The two doors into WA public-sector work

Western Australian public-sector civil work flows through two distinct buyers, each with its own rules. The State Government — departments and agencies like the Department of Finance, Main Roads WA, the Water Corporation and the regional development commissions — buys through the Tenders WA portal under the Procurement Act 2020 and the Western Australian Procurement Rules. Local governments — the State’s individual councils and shires — buy under the Local Government Act 1995 and the Local Government (Functions and General) Regulations 1996, advertising their own tenders and, very often, buying through the WALGA Preferred Supplier Program instead.

For a civil SME chasing the $50K to $2M band, both doors matter, and they behave differently. State work is concentrated in fewer, larger agencies and is heavily governed by prequalification. Local work is fragmented across many councils but is more accessible to smaller firms — provided you understand that the panel sitting behind the council, not the council’s own tender list, is where most of the routine civil spend is committed. The rest of this guide takes them in turn: state first, then local.

2. What Tenders WA is and why it matters

Tenders WA (tenders.wa.gov.au) is the Western Australian Government’s centralised electronic tendering portal. State Government departments and agencies are required to advertise tenders above the relevant threshold on the site, which gives you a single consolidated listing of state bidding opportunities rather than a scattered set of agency websites.^[1] The portal is operated within the Department of Finance’s government procurement function, which also publishes guidance on the tendering process and on supplying to government.^[2]

Registration is free. Once registered, you can elect to receive automatic email notifications of opportunities relevant to your business, download tender documentation electronically, and lodge responses through the portal. The site also publishes early tender advice (advance notice of upcoming opportunities) and award information for government contracts, which lets you research who is buying what and at what price.^[3]

For civil contractors, this is where state-level opportunities for road and intersection upgrades, drainage and stormwater works, earthworks packages, footpath and kerbing programs, and maintenance and minor-works contracts are advertised. Major infrastructure buyers including Main Roads WA list opportunities and early tender advice here, alongside the broader run of agency requirements.^[4] A single registered profile, with well-chosen notification categories, puts that in front of you the day it’s advertised — but as Section 6 explains, not every WA government buyer uses this portal, so it is your baseline rather than your whole strategy.

3. The framework behind the portal: the Procurement Act 2020 and WA Procurement Rules

The portal is the shop window; the rules behind it are the Western Australian Procurement Rules, issued as a General Procurement Direction under the Procurement Act 2020. The current rules are set out in General Procurement Direction 2025/07 and apply to State agencies across all types of procurement — goods, services and works.^[5]

This is comparatively recent architecture. The Procurement Act 2020 consolidated state procurement under a single legislative framework administered through the Department of Finance, replacing the older arrangements. The practical consequence for you is that each agency runs its own procurement within a common set of minimum rules: how it must go to market at each value band, the records it must keep, and the probity it must demonstrate. Evaluation reports, for example, are required for all procurements valued at $50,000 and above, with the documentation needing to justify the decision should it later come under scrutiny.^[6]

When you read a tender’s conditions, you are reading that agency’s application of the Procurement Rules to its specific requirement. The conditions of tendering, not your assumptions about “how WA usually does it,” always govern. The figures and thresholds in this guide reflect the published rules at the time of writing, but a specific opportunity’s documents are the authority for that bid.

4. Registering on Tenders WA — step by step

Registration is free and straightforward, and you should do it before you need it — you want notifications flowing well before a relevant tender drops.

Stage 1: Create your supplier account

From the Tenders WA site, register as a supplier. You’ll provide your business details — your ABN, contact details, and information about the products or services you supply. On completing the form, the request is processed and the system emails you a username and password to log in.^[7] Use a monitored business email address, because that is where all automated notifications will be dispatched.

Stage 2: Set your notification watchlists

The single most valuable thing you do at registration is configure your notifications against the right categories. The portal lets you set up watchlists and email alerts based on category codes, agency names, or keywords.^[8] Select the categories that match civil construction and your specific capabilities — earthworks and excavation, road and pavement works, drainage and stormwater, kerbing and footpaths, and any specialist trades you hold. Set this too narrowly and you’ll miss relevant tenders; set it too broadly and you’ll drown in irrelevant ones.

Stage 3: Use registration as a research tool, not just an alert feed

Registration also gives you access to contract award information and to agencies’ forward procurement plans. The State publishes a Strategic Forward Procurement Plan — an overview of planned agency procurements valued at $250,000 and above across two financial years — and a WA Pipeline of Work listing future infrastructure projects, both designed to help you identify opportunities early.^[9] For a civil SME, that advance window is when you assess capacity, line up plant and subcontractors, and decide whether to pursue — not the week the tender closes.

5. WA state procurement thresholds every civil contractor needs to know

Thresholds determine how an agency goes to market, which tells you whether you’ll be invited to quote, find an open tender online, or never see the opportunity at all. Under the Western Australian Procurement Rules, the state value bands are:^[10]

• Under $50,000 — direct sourcing. The agency can approach one or more suppliers directly, provided the purchase represents value for money. If you’re not already known to the agency, you won’t see most of this work.
• $50,000 to $250,000 — written quotations. The agency seeks written quotes from suppliers. This is the band where being on the agency’s radar, or on a relevant Common Use Arrangement, gets you invited.
• Over $250,000 — open (public) tender. The agency must advertise on Tenders WA and run a competitive open process. This is where your registered notifications earn their keep.

Award information for government contracts valued at $50,000 and above is published, which makes the portal a genuine research tool: you can see which agencies buy the kind of work you do, how often, and at roughly what value.^[11] Two cautions. Treatment of GST and the precise application of each band can vary, so confirm against the Procurement Rules and the specific tender. And agencies cannot split a requirement into smaller parcels to dodge the open-tender threshold — the rule looks at the total expected value of the requirement.

6. Common Use Arrangements and the agencies that buy off-portal

Beyond individual tenders, the Department of Finance maintains Common Use Arrangements (CUAs) — whole-of-government standing offer arrangements that pre-qualify suppliers for frequently purchased goods and services. Where a relevant CUA exists, agencies buy from the panel rather than running a fresh tender, and use of CUAs is mandatory for agencies in the Perth metropolitan area for covered categories.^[12] Getting onto a relevant CUA can provide a steadier flow of work without competing for individual tenders — though for heavy civil works the more important arrangements are usually project-based prequalification (Section 7) rather than goods-and-services CUAs.

Just as important is knowing what doesn’t route through Tenders WA. Several government trading enterprises and statutory bodies run their own e-procurement portals. The Water Corporation and Synergy, for example, use the Ariba e-procurement system; Fremantle Ports, Southern Ports and Busselton Water each operate their own tendering portals.^[13] If your business does drainage, earthworks, water infrastructure or marine civil work, registering only on Tenders WA will leave a hole in your coverage. Identify the major buyers in your discipline and register directly with each.

7. Main Roads WA and civil prequalification — the gateway to road and bridge work

For most civil contractors, Main Roads WA is the single largest source of state civil work — and it is the clearest example of why the portal alone isn’t enough. Main Roads advertises its road, bridge and infrastructure opportunities, and posts Early Tender Advice for upcoming work, through Tenders WA.^[14] But seeing the tender and being eligible to bid are two different things.

Prequalification under the National Prequalification System for Civil (Road and Bridge) Construction Contracts (NPS) is a mandatory requirement for Main Roads civil construction contracts.^[15] The NPS classifies contractors who want to tender for road and bridge work based on their technical and managerial expertise, financial capacity, and previous performance. The scheme is administered locally by each state and territory road agency — there is no central body — with Main Roads WA acting as the assessing agency in Western Australia.^[16]

Two features of the NPS matter for an SME’s strategy. First, classification carries a financial level as well as a technical category, so the system effectively caps the size of contract you can lead until you build the track record and balance sheet to step up. Second, the NPS offers mutual recognition across participating state road agencies, so a contractor prequalified in another state for road and bridge categories can seek recognition with Main Roads rather than starting from scratch — useful if you already hold a TfNSW, VicRoads or DIT (SA) classification.^[17] Main Roads also maintains a list of prequalified contractors, which is a practical pathway for smaller firms to be visible to the major lead contractors as subcontractors and joint-venture partners on big jobs.^[18]

The practical sequence for road and bridge work. Register on Tenders WA for visibility, then pursue NPS prequalification at a realistic financial level for your business, then use Main Roads’ prequalified-contractor list and subcontract pathways to build the performance history that lets you step up a level at renewal. Trying to win lead contracts before you’re prequalified is the most common wasted effort we see.

8. The policy machinery: Buy Local, WAIPS and Aboriginal procurement

Three policy frameworks sit alongside the Procurement Rules and shape how your bid is evaluated. They reward local content and participation, which is an advantage for a genuinely WA-based business and a hurdle for an interstate one.

The WA Buy Local Policy and WAIPS

The WA Buy Local Policy 2022 is designed to give local businesses enhanced access to the government market through a range of initiatives and regional price preferences, with the policy focused on regional sourcing for procurement below the thresholds of the Western Australian Industry Participation Strategy (WAIPS).^[19] WAIPS, made under the Western Australian Jobs Act 2017, requires suppliers on larger contracts to demonstrate how they will provide full, fair and reasonable opportunity to local industry — the WA equivalent of the local-content plans you may know from other states. The regional price preferences in particular can materially improve the competitiveness of a regional bid against a metropolitan or interstate one.

Aboriginal procurement

The Aboriginal Procurement Policy (General Procurement Direction 2025/03, effective 1 July 2025) sets agency targets for awarding contracts to registered Aboriginal businesses and applies to contracts valued at $50,000 and above.^[20] Separately, Aboriginal Participation Requirements apply as a mandatory condition on larger contracts (broadly, $5 million and above in key industries including construction), with Aboriginal employment and supplier targets that vary by region — higher in the Pilbara and Kimberley than in Perth and the South West.^[21] If your business is Aboriginal-owned, registration on the Aboriginal Business Directory WA or with Supply Nation makes you visible to buyers building shortlists. If it isn’t, but you’re chasing larger contracts, you’ll need a credible plan to meet the participation requirements as part of your response.

9. The local government channel and the $250,000 tender rule

Now to the second door. Western Australia’s councils and shires procure under the Local Government Act 1995 and the Local Government (Functions and General) Regulations 1996. The headline rule is that a local government must invite public tenders when the value of a contract for goods or services is, or is expected to be, more than $250,000 (excluding GST).^[22]

Below that, councils set their own quotation policies, and they vary. A common pattern is direct sourcing for very small purchases, two quotes in a middle band, and three written quotes from roughly $50,000 up to the $250,000 tender threshold — but each council’s purchasing policy defines its own bands, so the safest assumption is that any council job worth more than about $50,000 will involve a quote process you need to be invited into.^[23]

Here is the part that catches contractors out, and the reason the next sections matter so much. The $250,000 public-tender requirement has exemptions. When a council buys through a recognised arrangement — the WALGA Preferred Supplier Program, a State Government CUA, or an Australian Disability Enterprise — it does not have to run a public tender, even above $250,000, because the competitive process has already been satisfied at the panel level.^[24] In plain terms: a great deal of routine council civil work never appears as a public tender at all. It is awarded by inviting quotes from suppliers already on the WALGA panel. If you’re not on the panel, you don’t see it.

10. The WALGA Preferred Supplier Program explained

The Western Australian Local Government Association (WALGA) is the independent, member-based peak body that represents and supports the WA local government sector.^[25] Its Preferred Supplier Program (PSP) is a procurement option that lets WALGA Members — councils and shires — buy goods, services and works from a range of pre-qualified suppliers without running their own tender each time.^[26]

The numbers give a sense of the scale. The PSP consists of 12 Panels and over 160 categories, with Members able to access more than 1,300 Preferred Suppliers, and the panels collectively deliver an annual spend in the order of $380 million in goods, services and works to WALGA Members.^[27] WALGA tenders to appoint suppliers to each panel, so by the time a council uses the panel, the competitive selection has already been done.

The mechanism that makes this work is the tender exemption. The Local Government Regulations provide an exemption from the public-tender requirement for purchases made through the PSP, which is why a council can engage a preferred supplier directly rather than advertising a tender.^[28] To rely on that exemption, Members must reference the WALGA contract and related Member conditions in their dealings with preferred suppliers — so when you quote through the panel, you’re contracting under WALGA’s conditions, not the council’s standard form.^[29]

For suppliers, two commercial points are worth knowing up front. There is no cost to be a Preferred Supplier, but there is a management fee of up to 2% payable to WALGA on work obtained through the program, which funds its operating costs. And being on a panel guarantees you nothing — it makes you eligible to be invited to quote, not entitled to work.^[30]

11. The civil-relevant PSP panels — where your work actually sits

The PSP’s 12 panels span everything from ICT to recruitment, but four or five are where civil construction work lives. If you’re deciding which categories to target, start here.

PSP009 — Roads, Infrastructure and Depot Services

This is the core civil panel. All aspects of road construction and maintenance are covered, inclusive of works, services and related materials. The works covered include minor and major civil works, earthworks, plant hire, drainage, erosion control, potholes, kerbing, footpaths and crack sealing; services include line marking, sweeping, traffic management and utility location; and materials include gravel, bitumen, concrete drainage products and barriers. Consultancy services are specifically excluded from this panel — they sit on PSP002.^[31] For an earthworks, drainage or road maintenance contractor, this is the panel to be on.

PSP012 — Construction and Building Environments

This panel covers the construction of new buildings, refurbishment of existing buildings, and modular and prefabricated dwellings — but its categories also include Demolition, Earthworks and Site Remediation, which brings site-preparation civil work within scope.^[32] If your business does bulk earthworks, demolition or remediation as a standalone service, this panel is relevant alongside PSP009.

PSP002 — Engineering, Environmental and Technical Consultancy

This is the home for the technical and design services that wrap around civil delivery: road, pavement and footpath design engineering, geotechnical engineering, materials testing, surveying, structural and bridge engineering, and traffic and transport engineering.^[33] Civil consultancies and design-and-construct contractors with in-house engineering should look here.

PSP006 (Fleet) and PSP010 (Parks and Gardens)

Two further panels touch civil work at the edges. The Fleet panel includes the supply of earthmoving equipment, compaction and road construction equipment, and road maintenance trucks — relevant if you sell or hire plant rather than (or as well as) delivering works. The Parks and Gardens panel covers landscape infrastructure, fencing supply and installation, and related works, which overlaps with the soft-landscaping and reinstatement scope on many civil jobs.^[34]

12. Getting onto the PSP: the Member-endorsement pathway

This is the single most important — and most misunderstood — part of the WALGA system. You cannot simply apply to join the Preferred Supplier Program. WALGA does not run regular open tenders to add new suppliers to existing panels; the program is Member-driven, and an endorsement from a Local Government is generally required to be invited into the Request for Tender (RFT) through which suppliers are prequalified.^[35]

Critically, WALGA does not accept endorsements directly from commercial suppliers — the endorsement must come from a Member council to WALGA.^[36] The endorsement itself is a brief reference from the council that includes your company name and contact details, an overview of the goods or services you provide, the reason you’d be a suitable supplier (with confirmation that you have the capability and capacity to deliver to local government at a high standard), and the council’s intent to engage you through the panel if you’re appointed.^[37]

The strategic implication is clear: the route onto the panel runs through relationships with the councils you already do, or want to do, business with. A council that values your work and would like to keep using it through a compliant channel has every reason to endorse you. That makes direct engagement with WA councils — doing good work on smaller jobs, being known to the right procurement and works officers — the groundwork for panel access, not an alternative to it.

On timing, WALGA runs RFT processes to onboard new suppliers roughly twice a year (it has also issued public tenders when it develops a new category or where a category has too few suppliers to give Members enough quotes). A WALGA tender is generally open for four to six weeks, evaluation can take up to three months, and on average there is a three-to-five-month gap between a tender opening and a new Preferred Supplier contract going live.^[38] Endorsement also doesn’t guarantee appointment — the panels have minimum qualitative standards assessed through the tender, and WALGA may weigh whether a category is already well-supplied before issuing an invitation.^[39]

Plan around the lead time. Because intake windows are periodic and the end-to-end process runs months, getting onto the PSP is a medium-term play. Secure a council endorsement, watch for the relevant category’s next RFT, and build your prequalification submission before the window opens. Exact intake dates and endorsement deadlines are published by WALGA and shift between cycles, so confirm the current timetable directly.

13. How councils buy through the PSP, and practical strategies for WA civil SMEs

Once you’re on a panel, councils engage you through VendorPanel (WALGA’s eQuotes platform), where a Member runs a quotation request to preferred suppliers in the relevant category. It works much like any quote process, but a large part of the due diligence has already been done through panel prequalification.^[40] Pricing and conditions for each arrangement live within VendorPanel, and a “lowest price guarantee” is built into the program as a contractual condition of preferred suppliers — so your panel pricing needs to be genuinely competitive, not a list price you discount later.^[41]

Pulling the state and local picture together, here is how we’d sequence it for a WA civil SME:

• Register on Tenders WA first, with carefully chosen civil categories, so you have state-level visibility from day one — and register directly with the major off-portal buyers in your discipline (Water Corporation and others via Ariba).
• Treat prequalification as the real gateway to state road and bridge work. Pursue NPS Civil (Road and Bridge) classification at a financial level you can sustain, and use Main Roads’ prequalified-contractor list and subcontract pathways to build performance history.
• Use the forward-looking tools — the Strategic Forward Procurement Plan and the WA Pipeline of Work — to plan capacity months ahead rather than reacting to closing dates.
• At local level, prioritise getting onto the WALGA PSP, especially PSP009 (Roads) and, if relevant, PSP012 (Construction) and PSP002 (Engineering). Build the council relationships that produce an endorsement, and time your prequalification submission to the category’s next RFT window.
• Don’t ignore councils’ own tenders. Public tenders above $250,000 are still advertised — typically in The West Australian on Wednesdays and Saturdays and on each council’s website — and not every council uses WALGA for everything, since the PSP is one of several procurement options open to them.^[42]
• Lean into local content. A WA-based business with genuine regional presence is advantaged under the Buy Local Policy, WAIPS and council-level regional price preferences. Make that advantage explicit and evidenced in your responses rather than assuming the evaluator will infer it.

Win the state and local games on their own terms, and the two doors reinforce each other: prequalification and a track record on Main Roads or major agency work strengthen the case for a council endorsement onto the PSP, and a strong council reference history supports your standing on larger state tenders.

A note on currency. Procurement thresholds, prequalification requirements, PSP panel structures, intake timetables and policy weightings change. The figures in this guide reflect the published Western Australian sources at the time of writing, but before you commit a bid or a panel submission, confirm the current detail against the conditions of tendering for your specific opportunity and the relevant material on the Tenders WA, Department of Finance, Main Roads WA and WALGA websites.

References & Sources

1. All WA State Government departments and agencies must advertise tenders over a certain threshold on the Tenders WA web portal, where suppliers can register and receive notifications. See Small Business Development Corporation (WA), Tenders — smallbusiness.wa.gov.au; and the portal at tenders.wa.gov.au. ↩
2. Information on the tendering process and a guide to supplying to government is published through the Department of Finance government procurement function. See Small Business Development Corporation (WA), Tenders — smallbusiness.wa.gov.au. ↩
3. Tenders WA advertises public requests and early tender advice and publishes awarded contracts; registration is free, with watchlists and email notifications by category, agency or keyword. See Government of WA, Tenders — wa.gov.au; and Australia Tender Alerts, WA Government Tenders — australiatenderalerts.com. ↩
4. Tenders WA is the centralised portal, carrying major opportunities including those of Main Roads WA. See Australia Tender Alerts, WA Government Tenders — australiatenderalerts.com; and examples of Main Roads opportunities advertised via the portal at Australian Tenders, Main Roads WA — australiantenders.com.au. ↩
5. The Western Australian Procurement Rules are issued as General Procurement Direction 2025/07 under the Procurement Act 2020, applying to State agencies for goods, services and works. See Government of WA, Western Australian Procurement Rules — Appendix 1: Defined terms — wa.gov.au. ↩
6. Evaluation reports must be prepared for all procurements valued at $50,000 and above, with documentation sufficient to demonstrate probity and justify the decision. See Department of Treasury and Finance (WA), Western Australian Procurement Rules FAQs — wa.gov.au. ↩
7. Registration requires business details including ABN; on completing the form, the system emails a username and password to log in. See Tenders WA registration — tenders.wa.gov.au; and Australia Tender Alerts, WA Government Tenders — australiatenderalerts.com. ↩
8. The portal allows watchlists and email notifications based on category codes, agency names or keywords, and gives access to contract award information and forward procurement plans. See Australia Tender Alerts, WA Government Tenders — australiatenderalerts.com. ↩
9. The Strategic Forward Procurement Plan gives an overview of agency procurements valued at $250,000 and above across two financial years, and the WA Pipeline of Work lists future infrastructure projects. See Government of WA, Tenders — wa.gov.au. ↩
10. WA Government procurement thresholds under the Procurement Rules: under $50,000 direct sourcing; $50,000–$250,000 written quotations; over $250,000 open (public) tender. See Psithur / AwardedTenders.au, Queensland and Western Australia Procurement Guide 2026 (citing the WA Procurement Rules / General Procurement Direction 2025/07) — awardedtenders.au; and Australia Tender Alerts, WA Government Tenders — australiatenderalerts.com. Confirm GST treatment and band application against the current Rules. ↩
11. Tenders WA provides award information of government contracts valued at $50,000 and above. See Government of WA, Western Australian Procurement Rules — Appendix 1: Defined terms — wa.gov.au. ↩
12. The Department of Finance maintains Common Use Arrangements (CUAs) that pre-qualify suppliers for frequently purchased goods and services; CUAs are mandatory for agencies in the Perth metropolitan area for covered categories. See Australia Tender Alerts, WA Government Tenders — australiatenderalerts.com; and Psithur / AwardedTenders.au, Procurement Guide 2026 — awardedtenders.au. ↩
13. Several WA government trading enterprises and statutory bodies run their own e-procurement portals — for example the Water Corporation and Synergy use Ariba, and Fremantle Ports, Southern Ports and Busselton Water operate their own tendering portals. See Government of WA, Tenders — Related Sites — wa.gov.au. ↩
14. Main Roads WA advertises opportunities and posts Early Tender Advice through Tenders WA, and uses Purchase Orders for purchases greater than $20,000. See Main Roads WA, Regional Information Session handout (PDF) — mainroads.wa.gov.au. ↩
15. Prequalification under the National Prequalification System for Civil (Road and Bridge) Construction is a mandatory requirement for Main Roads civil construction contracts. See Main Roads WA, National Prequalification System — Requirements (PDF) — mainroads.wa.gov.au. ↩
16. The NPS classifies contractors who wish to tender for road and bridge construction by technical and managerial expertise, financial capacity and previous performance; it is administered locally by state and territory road agencies, with no central body. See Austroads, National Prequalification — austroads.gov.au. ↩
17. The NPS provides mutual recognition across participating state road agencies for road and bridge categories and financial levels, allowing contractors prequalified elsewhere to seek recognition rather than reapplying from scratch. See Austroads, National Prequalification — austroads.gov.au. ↩
18. Many Main Roads contracts require prequalification, and Main Roads maintains a list of prequalified contractors that provides a pathway for subcontractors, joint-venture partners and suppliers to connect with lead contractors on major works. See Western Trade Coast Business Directory, Main Roads WA Tenders — westerntradecoastbusinessdirectory.com.au. ↩
19. The WA Buy Local Policy 2022 provides local businesses with enhanced access to the government market through initiatives and regional price preferences, supporting the Western Australian Industry Participation Strategy (WAIPS) under the WA Jobs Act 2017; the lead agency is the Department of Jobs, Tourism, Science and Innovation. See Government of WA, WA Buy Local Policy — wa.gov.au. ↩
20. The Aboriginal Procurement Policy (General Procurement Direction 2025/03, effective 1 July 2025) sets agency targets and applies to contracts valued at $50,000 and above. See Psithur / AwardedTenders.au, Procurement Guide 2026 (citing GPD 2025/03) — awardedtenders.au. ↩
21. Aboriginal Participation Requirements apply as a mandatory condition for contracts of approximately $5 million and above in key industries, with regional employment targets that are higher in the Pilbara and Kimberley than in Perth and the South West. See Psithur / AwardedTenders.au, Procurement Guide 2026 — awardedtenders.au. Confirm current targets against the Department of Finance APR guidance. ↩
22. The Local Government (Functions and General) Regulations 1996 require a local government to call public tenders where the value of a contract for goods or services is, or is expected to be, over $250,000 (excluding GST). See Shire of Morawa, Tenders Register — morawa.wa.gov.au. ↩
23. Councils set their own quotation bands below the $250,000 tender threshold; a common pattern is direct sourcing for small purchases, two quotes in a middle band, and three written quotes from about $50,000 to $250,000. Example: City of Gosnells, Tenders and Purchasing — gosnells.wa.gov.au. Bands vary by council; check the relevant council’s purchasing policy. ↩
24. When procuring goods or services valued at $250,000 or more, a council must use a public procurement process — but recognised arrangements that satisfy the requirement include WALGA Preferred Suppliers, State Government CUAs and Disability Enterprises. See City of Gosnells, Tenders and Purchasing — gosnells.wa.gov.au. ↩
25. WALGA is an independent, member-based, not-for-profit organisation representing and supporting the WA local government sector. See WALGA, Preferred Supplier Program — walga.asn.au. ↩
26. The Preferred Supplier Program (PSP) is a procurement option for WALGA Members to purchase goods, services and works from a range of pre-qualified suppliers. See WALGA, Preferred Supplier Program — walga.asn.au. ↩
27. The PSP consists of 12 Panels and over 160 categories, with access to more than 1,300 Preferred Suppliers, delivering an annual spend of around $380 million to WALGA Members. See WALGA, Preferred Supplier Program — walga.asn.au; and WALGA Preferred Supplier Portal — walgaprefsup.powerappsportals.com. ↩
28. The Local Government Regulations provide a tender exemption for purchases through the PSP, allowing Members to engage prequalified suppliers directly rather than undertaking a full tender. See WALGA, Information for Members — walga.asn.au. ↩
29. Members must reference the WALGA contract and related Member conditions in communications with Preferred Suppliers to remain compliant with the WALGA exemption to the Local Government (Functions and General) Regulations 1996. See WALGA, Become a Preferred Supplier (panel pages) — walga.asn.au. ↩
30. There is no cost to be a Preferred Supplier, but a management fee of up to 2% is payable on work obtained through the PSP, which funds the program’s operating costs; the PSP does not guarantee suppliers work. See WALGA, Information for Preferred Suppliers — walga.asn.au. ↩
31. PSP009 (Roads, Infrastructure and Depot Services) covers all aspects of road construction and maintenance inclusive of works (minor/major civil works, earthworks, plant hire, drainage, erosion control, potholes, kerbing, footpaths, crack sealing), services and materials (gravel, bitumen, concrete drainage products, barriers); consultancy services are excluded. See WALGA, Become a Preferred Supplier — walga.asn.au. ↩
32. PSP012 (Construction and Building Environments) covers new buildings, refurbishment and modular/prefabricated dwellings, with categories including Demolition, Earthworks and Site Remediation. See WALGA, Become a Preferred Supplier — walga.asn.au. ↩
33. PSP002 (Engineering, Environmental and Technical Consultancy) categories include Road, Pavement and Footpath Design Engineering, Geotechnical Engineering, Materials Testing, Surveying, Structural Engineering, Bridge Engineering, and Traffic and Transport Engineering. See WALGA, Become a Preferred Supplier — walga.asn.au. ↩
34. PSP006 (Fleet) includes supply of earthmoving equipment, compaction and road construction equipment, and road maintenance trucks; PSP010 (Parks and Gardens) includes landscape infrastructure works and maintenance and fencing supply and services. See WALGA, Become a Preferred Supplier — walga.asn.au. ↩
35. WALGA does not run regular tenders to invite new Preferred Suppliers into existing panels; the program is Member-driven, and an endorsement from a Local Government is generally required to be invited into the RFT. See WALGA, Preferred Supplier Program — walga.asn.au; and Become a Preferred Supplier — walga.asn.au. ↩
36. WALGA does not receive endorsements directly from commercial suppliers; endorsements are submitted by Member Local Governments to WALGA. See WALGA, Become a Preferred Supplier — walga.asn.au. ↩
37. A Local Government endorsement is a brief reference including the company name and contact details, an overview of goods/services, the reason the supplier is suitable (with confirmation of capability and capacity to deliver to local government), and intent to engage the supplier through the panel if appointed. See WALGA, Become a Preferred Supplier — walga.asn.au. ↩
38. WALGA’s RFT processes to onboard new suppliers occur roughly twice a year (with public tenders also issued for new categories or under-supplied categories); tenders are generally open four to six weeks, evaluation can take up to three months, and there is on average a three-to-five-month period between a tender opening and a new Preferred Supplier contract going live. Intake windows and endorsement deadlines vary between cycles. See WALGA, Become a Preferred Supplier — walga.asn.au. ↩
39. The PSP has minimum qualitative standards assessed through the tender, and WALGA may prioritise areas of demand or consider whether a category is already well-supplied before issuing an invitation; endorsement does not guarantee appointment. See WALGA, Become a Preferred Supplier — walga.asn.au. ↩
40. Members request quotes from prequalified panel suppliers through VendorPanel (WALGA’s eQuotes platform), with much of the due diligence already completed at panel qualification. See WALGA, Information for Members — walga.asn.au; and VendorPanel — vendorpanel.com.au. ↩
41. Pricing and conditions for each arrangement are available within eQuotes/VendorPanel, and WALGA achieves a “lowest price guarantee” as a contractual requirement of preferred suppliers. See WALGA Preferred Supplier Portal — walgaprefsup.powerappsportals.com; and WALGA panel pages, Become a Preferred Supplier — walga.asn.au. ↩
42. It is not mandatory for Local Governments to use WALGA Preferred Supply — it is one of several procurement options — and where a council goes to public tender these are usually advertised in The West Australian on Wednesdays and Saturdays and published on the council’s website. See WALGA, Become a Preferred Supplier — walga.asn.au. ↩