What is OTIF (on time in full)? A guide for UK suppliers

Take four UK buyers whose supplier documents were public in October 2026. Travis Perkins counts order lines. Marks & Spencer's 2019 ambient food handbook set in full by the case quantity ordered for each product. Ocado allows 30 minutes either side of an allocated slot, and Wickes asks the same of deliveries made direct to its customers. Same three letters, different rules. A fifth, NHS Supply Chain, names OTIF as its service level for stocked lines but leaves the measure to its framework agreement.

What is OTIF (on time in full)?

A delivery measure your customer keeps on you. A 2019 paper by McKinsey and the Trading Partner Alliance puts it this way: "OTIF measures the extent to which shipments are delivered to their destination according to both the quantity and schedule specified on the order."

It has two halves:

• On time means the delivery arrived when the order said it should. Depending on the buyer, that is the due date on the purchase order, a booked delivery slot, or both.
• In full means the quantity received matches the quantity ordered, counted per order, per order line or per case.

The order is the baseline, and the receipt is the evidence. Marks & Spencer's 2019 handbook says it plainly: "OTIF is a reflection of what has been ordered on a PO against what has been goods receipted."

So OTIF is a data question as much as a transport one. The score is only as good as the order you were sent and the record of what arrived.

How do UK buyers define OTIF?

Each in its own document. Here are four that publish theirs, with the date of each. Each binds only that buyer's suppliers, under that buyer's terms.

NHS Supply Chain is the exception worth knowing. Its Operational Supplier Requirements, Version 4.1, online since March 2025, name OTIF in their contents list, as "Service level (OTIF on time in full)", but give no formula. For stocked products they say service levels must be delivered in accordance with Schedule 8 (Service levels) of the framework agreement, so the measure sits in the agreement, not the manual. What the document itself sets are delivery rules: bookings made at least three working days ahead, goods delivered in line with the due date on the purchase order, and a delivery classed as late if it arrives over 30 minutes after the booking time.

Travis Perkins and Wickes share their wording. Wickes was part of the Travis Perkins group until 2021, so read the two as one method used by two buyers. They do not prove a UK norm.

The Travis Perkins manual is the most explicit. It gives two formulas:

• "On Time = The number of on time ordered lines / total number of ordered lines for the month x 100."
• "In Full = The number of completed order lines / total number of order lines for the month x 100."

Is there one UK definition of OTIF?

No. We found no UK law or industry standard that defines it, and the Groceries Supply Code of Practice does not define OTIF or service levels. The definition is whatever your customer's manual or agreement says.

The McKinsey and Trading Partner Alliance paper found the same on a wider scale: "there is no standard definition for OTIF, so different supply-chain participants may interpret the metric in significantly different ways." That survey covered 24 retailers and manufacturers in North America, so treat it as a description of the problem. It is not UK data.

GS1 UK's Perfect Order programme does not define OTIF either. Published in November 2016 as "a collaboration between leading retailers and suppliers, facilitated by GS1 UK, to harmonise in-bound delivery requirements for the UK Retail Grocery/CPG industry", it sets minimum requirements for deliveries and the data that travels with them. It gives no OTIF formula.

If your customer's definition is not published, ask for it in writing before you try to improve against it. The peak-season EDI checklist starts in the same place: "Your retailers set their own rules, so the first check is to find them."

How is OTIF calculated?

As a percentage, but of what depends on the unit your customer counts. The McKinsey paper names the choice: in full can be measured "at the level of complete orders, line-items or individual cases".

Take an illustrative order of 4 lines, with 4 cases on each line, so 16 cases in all. It arrives on time, but one line arrives with 2 cases instead of 4.

One lorry, three different scores. Of the buyers above, Travis Perkins and Wickes count order lines for each SKU. M&S's 2019 handbook labels its measure "Orders receipted on time in full" and sets in full by the case quantity ordered for each product, without giving the arithmetic.

In the survey behind the McKinsey paper, 79 percent of respondents preferred to define in full at the case level. The paper backs that unit for its proposed definition because it "gives the manufacturer credit for a partially filled (on-time) delivery". That was a proposal. No buyer is bound by it.

Buyers also differ on whether on time and in full are one number or two. Travis Perkins defines On Time and In Full as two monthly percentages; M&S combined them into one weekly score.

What counts as on time?

The due date, the slot, or both. Wickes is explicit about the date: "we require the full quantity ordered to be delivered on the due date as stated on the PO."

The 30-minute tolerance recurs across these documents, but the anchor differs: an allocated slot at Ocado, a booking slot at M&S, a booking time at NHS Supply Chain, and an agreed slot on deliveries made direct to Wickes customers. Early can miss too. M&S's 2019 handbook sets an arrival window for its Bradford depot, separate from its OTIF measure: "A delivery will be defined early if earlier than 30 minutes before its booking slot." Ocado may reject a load that arrives outside its slot without prior warning, and NHS Supply Chain may refuse entry to a driver who arrives more than 30 minutes early.

The McKinsey survey "found no consensus regarding the window of time within which a delivery can be classified as on-time". GS1 UK's 2016 Perfect Order requirements leave timing to each relationship: "All deliveries should be delivered and off-loaded to the agreed schedule specified by the commercial relationship." Read the line in your own agreement.

Where does your OTIF score come from?

Your customer's records, measured against its order. Ocado's manual states the rule in one sentence: "Suppliers are required to meet the delivery in full, on the due date and at the time specified on the order." Each document either side of the delivery has a job.

The order. The purchase order sets the quantities, the due date and the delivery point. The purchase order guide covers how to read one from the receiving end. M&S's 2019 handbook shows why timing on paper matters too: "Anything booked onto a PO post delivery date will count as a shortage."

The despatch advice. GS1 defines it as "A message specifying details for goods despatched or ready for despatch under agreed conditions." In the UK it is usually called the ASN. GS1 UK's implementation guideline says the message "uses SSCCs to identify each logistics unit", with GTINs for each product line, and lists "early notification of any delivery shortfalls" among its benefits. Ocado says an ASN "must state the actual contents of a delivery". The ASN guide explains the mechanics: "Each pallet carries an SSCC barcode that the ASN maps to the cases and units inside it, so warehouse staff can scan goods straight into stock."

GS1 UK's 2016 Perfect Order requirements list the minimum content of an ASN, including the "Purchase Order reference", the "Delivery details including booking reference, delivery due date and time slot" and the "Total number of cases by line". Those are the things on time and in full are judged against. And the ASN "shall be sent in a sufficiently timely manner to ensure receipt by the customer prior to arrival of the delivery at the customer's premises".

The pallet and product codes. The SSCC guide describes goods-in: "At goods-in the warehouse scans each pallet's SSCC and matches it against the despatch advice that listed it before the goods arrived." In full is then counted against product lines, and a product line is identified by its GTIN. Get the identifier wrong and, as the EDI numbers guide puts it: "Orders can be rejected outright, sent to the wrong location, or matched to the wrong product line, which then holds up picking, despatch and invoicing."

The receiving advice. Some buyers send a message back. GS1's receiving advice is used "to inform about discrepancies between goods received and goods ordered/planned."

Records on the two sides can differ. In its 2016 investigation into Tesco, the Groceries Code Adjudicator found that "most suppliers have service level targets which are assessed from data held on Tesco Link", and that "Disputes sometimes arose about the volume of product that had actually been delivered to Tesco, with Tesco and the supplier having different numbers in their records". That describes one retailer in 2016, not anyone today. The point still holds: a supplier with an accurate despatch record, pallet by pallet, has its own version of what was sent.

OTIF vs on-time delivery, fill rate and DIFOT

• On-time delivery measures the schedule only. A delivery can be on time and still short.
• Fill rate measures the quantity only, often by case. The McKinsey paper describes the consumer industry as "moving away from the traditional" case-fill rate towards OTIF, which adds the schedule to the quantity.
• OTIF measures both, on the same order.
• DIFOT is delivery in full, on time: the same idea with the words reversed. Your customer's definition still decides the unit and the window.

Service levels and your supply agreement

For the large grocery retailers covered by the Groceries Supply Code of Practice, the starting point is the agreement. Paragraph 5 of the Code says: "A Retailer must pay a Supplier for Groceries delivered to that Retailer’s specification in accordance with the relevant Supply Agreement".

The Groceries Code Adjudicator has addressed service levels directly. In a 2014 code clarification, which cites Paragraph 3(1) of the Code on variation of supply agreements, it said: "Requesting supplier payments for failure to meet target service levels which are not set out in supply agreements is recognised as not being consistent with the Code". In its 2016 Tesco report, it recommended to Tesco that the method for calculating any money due from suppliers "should be clear and explained in the supply agreement".

The practical reading is simple. Know which measure you are signed up to, at which unit, against which window. If your agreement does not say, ask your buyer to write it down. That is the Code's and the regulator's wording, not legal advice.

Seeing your delivery data with Transalis

Transalis is a managed outcomes provider for B2B integration, EDI and eInvoicing. OTIF is your customer's measure. What Transalis looks after is the data your side of it rests on: the orders that come in and the despatch notes that go out.

The EDI page is direct about the ASN: "Retailer gates check it before goods arrive, so accuracy here prevents rejected deliveries." For suppliers who trade from a browser, Web EDI comes "with automated pallet-label (SSCC) printing for retailer compliance built in".

Transalis DataTrack™ lets you "See every order, dispatch note and invoice the moment it moves: sent, received, processed, delivered." When something fails, its error insight "flags a problem the moment it appears, and tells your team exactly what to fix."

The chargebacks story of a UK poultry producer shows what happens when despatch data stops flowing: "Advance shipping notices stopped registering, the distribution centre rejected the loads, and trucks were turned away with perishable stock on board."

Map your supply chain with us, or see how DataTrack shows every document in flight.