How to create a Tender

Tender manages all of your project's tenders and the incoming bids. This is done by creating tenders, setting up requirements, and inviting bidders. A questions and answers section and other tools in Tender are used for managing the tender process successfully.

In this article, we will go over how to create and set up tenders and their requirements.

How to create a tender

Go to TenderClick on a tender group Add tender 'Create new tender'.

The general information is pre-filled based on the tender group template. Review and adjust the details as needed before saving.

Name: The name of the tender, visible to bidders.

Client: The name of the client, visible to bidders.

Status

• Draft: The tender is only visible to the tender organization and cannot be accessed by bidders.
• Ongoing: The tender is active and, depending on the prequalification and start settings, it may be visible and accessible to invited bidders.

Contact person: The name, phone number, and email address of the person responsible for responding to questions related to the tender content.

Tender description: Provide a short description of the tender to give bidders a clear understanding of the scope. This is particularly useful for public tenders, as it helps ensure that only relevant bidders sign up.

Tender format: The tender format is used only for filtering and search purposes and does not affect the tender’s content or behavior. It is visible to bidders and must comply with all legal requirements in your region or country.
You can enter a tender format yourself or you can choose the tender format between:

• Private tender
• Design competition
• Public tender with prequalification
• Public tender without prequalification
• Multi-stage tender

Contract type: The contract type is used only for filtering and search purposes and does not affect the tender’s content or behavior. It is visible to bidders and must comply with all legal requirements in your region or country.
You can enter a contract type yourself, or you can choose between:

• Main contract
• General contract
• Subcontractor contract

See bids before deadline: This allows the tender responsible to view submitted bids before the deadline and must be enabled before the tender status is changed to 'Ongoing'. Bidders will be notified if this option is enabled when they submit a bid.
This option is not available for prequalification or public tenders (see below).

Prequalification/Public tender: If you select the ‘Prequalification/Public Tender’ option, a shareable link will be generated, allowing access to the tender without requiring an invitation from the tender manager.

Publication date: To enable early, limited access to the tender, tick the ‘Publication Date’ box and select a date below. 
This allows prequalified parties or the public to view the tender files without submitting a bid, giving all potential bidders a chance to review the documents before the bidding process begins.

Deadlines and dates: When setting the status to 'Ongoing', you need to decide on the tender start and deadline.

• Tender start: This defines when bidders can start interacting with the tender, like downloading the tender files and placing bids.
• Tender deadline: This defines how long bidders can place their bids and thus when the tender ends. Bidders can edit their bids until the deadline for the tender, but the bids will be locked when the deadline has passed.

Files: Tick this box if you want all files automatically synced to this tender from the tender group files. This applies to all current files and any new files added later, but not to new versions of existing files (see file versions below).

Use this feature to ensure that all files uploaded to the tender group are also available in this tender.

File versions: Tick this box if you want all new versions of files already added to this tender to be updated automatically when they are updated at the group tender files level.

Use this feature to ensure that any new file versions uploaded to the tender group are automatically updated in this tender.

Questions and answers: Using the questions and answers feature, you can easily manage questions from the bidders for your tender with several options on how to provide answers. 

To enable questions and answers, check the 'Enable questions and answers' box in the tender creation window (if the tender has already been created, you can select it and click Edit):

Questions will be private by default, but can be set to public if needed. To make questions visible to everyone, check the box next to 'Public questions'. Public questions are visible to all bidders and observers in the tender.

You can toggle whether bidders should be allowed to send questions after the deadline or not.

Tender requirements 

To ensure bidders comply with your tender requirements, you can set specific requirements such as text, list, number, document, or a European Single Procurement Document (ESPD). 

Mandatory requirements must be fulfilled before a bid can be submitted, helping enforce standards and reduce errors.

Create tender requirements

All tenders will be created with one requirement in the form of a document called 'Document'. 

You can change this requirement if needed.  A tender must always have at least one requirement set up.

To create your tender requirements, go to

Tender requirements Edit or Copy from company:

You can then make new tender requirements or import them from your company profile.

In your tender requirements, you have the option to include:

• Text
• List
• Integer or Decimal
• Document
• ESPD document

By default, they are optional, but you can set them as mandatory for bidders before they can upload a bid.

New tenders will always require a document called "Document". You can modify this during setup, but at least one required field is necessary.

Manage tender files

Files and folders are managed at the tender group level. Please read this article for more details: How to create a Tender group.

From the tender, you can see which Versions have been added, or Remove a file entirely. 

Removing a file from an 'Ongoing' tender will notify all bidders of the change.

Bidders

A bidder an individual that submits a proposal to win a contract.

These roles can be found in TenderSelect the tenderBidders.

Bidders are organized into user groups, typically by company. A bidder group can include multiple users, but only one user is responsible for submitting the bid.

• Bidders: Invited bidders for this tender who can currently download, submit a bid, and will be notified about changes.
• Deleted/Unsubscribed bidders: Former bidders who have been removed by an responsible or who have unsubscribed themselves. They will not be notified about changes.

If you want to learn more about inviting bidders, you can read this article: How to invite bidders to Tender.

Duplicate a tender

To save time, you can duplicate an already created tender. This can also be used to get a second offer from a select couple of bidders, as you can choose which bidders should be copied to the new tender.

To duplicate a tender, go to Group tender Add tender 'Create a copy':

In this instance, 'Foundations' has been duplicated to get a second-round offer from two bidders. As such, only the VAT number, total sum, and the pricelist from the tender requirements have been copied over.