A brief guide to tenders for beginners
You would be hard pressed to find a company or organisation that does not want to expand the reach of their business, including the products and services that they have to offer. Every entrepreneur strives to achieve this. And, responding to tenders that are announced regularly in the field wherein your expertise lies, lends the much-needed push to businesses. Read on to know more about tendering.
What is a tender?
A tender is an act of inviting bids for a project. It is a method through which organisations invite bids for huge projects which should be applied for within a defined deadline. These tenders can vary from international tenders like Romania tenders to government tenders.
Further, tendering is a process in which organisations express their willingness in response to an invitation or a request for a tender. To be specific, organisations will be seeking out for other businesses to respond to their particular requirements, which can be the supply of goods or services or both. Tenders are heavily advertised to offer opportunities to numerous suppliers, promoting healthy competition and to provide a better group of offers to choose from. Further, the organisation will be finalising an offer or bid which fulfils the organisation’s needs and offers the best economy.
Tendering is practised by the following organisations:
- Government organisations
- Corporate organisations
- Non-government organisations
- Overseas markets and businesses
Benefits of Tendering:-
- Equal opportunities for all competitors: Tenders or bids are solely analysed on account of pre-defined factors, such as price, quality, and cost-effectiveness. The evaluation process on the basis of these factors automatically removes the chances of malpractice.
- Economical: The fair competition among rivals leads to competitive pricing of products and services offered by the companies during the tendering process.
Important steps in the tender process:-
- Issue of tenders: When tenders are released, organisations can issue tenders as open, selective, multi-stage, or invited. Tenders can also be issued through ways such as EOI (Expressions of interest), RFI (Request for information), RFP (Request for proposal), RFQ (Request for quotation), and RFT (Request for tender).
- Tender request is prepared and placed: Companies prepare their tender request in accordance with the contractual requirements and place their request as specified in the guidelines of the tender notice.
- Shortlisting: Each tender is checked for eligibility and then checked against the factors mentioned in the tender document.
- Tenders are invited: Companies that are eligible for the tender are shortlisted and invited.
- Notification and debriefing: After the contract is allocated, the company getting the contract will be told in writing of the outcome. The companies which failed to win the tender will be offered a debriefing interview.
- Contracts established and managed: The selected company would have to formulate a formal agreement with the organisation.
Nowadays, tender notices from various organizations can be easily found on online portals that curate them from different sources and offer filtering options on the basis of industry. Also, these portals let one search bid opportunities country-wise or region-wise, like Romania tenders, South Asia tenders, African tenders, etc.