Check each stage of the route
A missing alert does not, by itself, prove a portal failed. The notice might be outside a saved search, published by a different buyer, sent to another address or present in an email nobody reviewed. The checks below are possible causes to investigate, not measured failure rates for any platform.
Start with a known notice and its original link. Establish where and when it was published before changing the monitoring rules.
Search terms and filters may be too narrow
A buyer might describe your usual renovation work as “rehabilitation” or “fit-up.” A category filter can also exclude a relevant project if your saved search uses a different classification.
Search for the known notice by its reference number, then compare it with your normal search. Relax one filter at a time to identify what excluded it. CanadaBuys documents its available search criteria in its official guide.
Official reference: CanadaBuys search terms and filters.
The buyer may publish somewhere else
Maintain a buyer-to-portal register. Check whether the missing notice came from a buyer portal your subscription actually covers. A familiar platform name is not evidence that every buyer on that platform is included.
When a buyer changes its procurement website, confirm that the new address, supplier registration and saved alerts are in your register. Review your source list when entering a new territory, rather than only when something goes missing.
The message may have arrived but lost context
Inspect the original email, recipient and delivery time. Check filtering rules, shared inbox ownership and forwarding. Compare the message body with the full notice: an alert may contain less scope information than the tender package.
If your workflow converts emails into records, compare the extracted title, dates and source link with the original email. The right fix might be in message handling rather than in the search profile.
Reconcile a small sample regularly
Missing notice investigation
- Original notice URL and reference: __________________
- Publication date and buyer: __________________
- Included in agreed sources? YES / NO / CHECK
- Matches the saved search? YES / NO / CHECK
- Original alert received? YES / NO / CHECK
- Forwarded and processed correctly? YES / NO / NOT APPLICABLE
- Fix, owner and next review: __________________
This gives you a traceable improvement instead of an ever-growing keyword list. Compare the repaired search against other relevant notices before deciding the gap is resolved.
See our coverage methods and how to define a monitoring profile.
A practical working guide. For any procurement, follow the current buyer notice and its amendments.
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