What is a tender anyway?

What is a tender anyway?

A tender is a formal request for bids or proposals from suppliers to provide a specified set of goods or services. UK Public Sector bodies are required by EU law to go to open tender for any procurements over a set threshold (currently around £150k) and any tenders over this value must be advertised in a document called the Official Journal of the European Union (or OJEU for short). OJEU tenders are available free at http://ted.europa.eu Tenders published on OJEU have to be managed according to a set process and the tender notices adhere to a standard format.

Many UK bodies also publish tenders that fall below this threshold, sometimes they do this on OJEU, sometimes on their own websites and occasionally they advertise tenders in trade magazines or local newspapers. These so-called ‘lower value’ tenders vary hugely in their level of formality and may not require as much documentation from the supplier as those advertised through OJEU.

Values of tenders posted on Skillfair have ranged from £1500 to £1.5million and the tender processes can likewise vary from a simple 2 page proposal and an interview to a full tender process requiring 100s of pages of documentation to be produced by each bidder.

Private and 3rd sector organisations use tendering too – but don’t generally publicise their requirements. In these cases suppliers are more likely to be specifically invited to bid by the client following some form of market assessment.

Larger procurements often have two or more stages - the idea being that the client will first issue a PQQ (Pre-Qualifying Questionnaire) that will allow them to reduce the number of bidders to a manageable level - usually fewer than 10. PQQs often ask for documents such as equality policies, health and safety policies etc and some basic information about your company and services. There's an example PQQ in the Skillfair resources centre.

If you get through the PQQ stage then a longer document or tender will be issued, known as an ITT or Invitation to Tender. This should contain all the information you need to work out what's wanted and how much to bid. Often the ITT will specify a named contact that any questions must be directed to and you should take care to follow any instructions about this and the form of the final tender carefully.

Other related jargon includes;

RFP - request for proposal
RFQ - request for quotation
BAFO – Best and Final Offer

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