Invitation to tender and completing your return

Invitation to tender 

The invitation to tender is a request to suppliers to make an offer. The tender pack will include a: 

• Letter of invitation outlining details of all the documents in the pack and the closing date for return of tenders 
• Terms of contract 
• Specification 
• Pricing schedule 
• Evaluation criteria used to score the responses 

We are keen to keep the information needed to the minimum so we can evaluate suppliers equally and fairly. The type of information required will be outlined in the tender document.

You might need to provide supporting evidence and you could be asked to do a presentation or interview with members of the evaluation panel. 

If you have any doubts or queries during the tendering process, you can contact the Procurement team to ask the question. This should always be done as a notification on The Chest. The Team will always provide a response, which will also be sent to any potential suppliers participating in the tender process. 

Register your details on The Chest (button)

Tips on how to respond to a tender and filling in your return

You should:

• read the tender documentation thoroughly and if there is anything you don't understand please contact us. It is part of our job to assist you
• understand your customer - look at the website and read the procurement information and guidance - it will help you understand the priorities, processes and requirements
• answer in full – don’t assume anything is obvious, or 'goes without saying'. If you're only writing three or four sentence answers, you probably need to be providing more detail or examples
• provide any relevant evidence that you think will help support your bid. Even if you have previously done some work for the councils or, if you are the present contractor, your submission will be evaluated solely on what you have written in your response. 
• think “added value”– what can your company offer towards social value in environmental, social or community benefits 
• make it clear which question your answer refers to - clearly numbered paragraphs are easier and clearer to evaluate than a page of unbroken writing. Make it easy for our team to give you points
• work out the most important questions from the evaluation criteria weightings in the tender documents, and take extra care to answer them fully
• be clear on your pricing model - state any assumptions you made when pricing (for example -  availability of resources, timing).

Checklist for when you are ready to send it back to us

You should:

• check that you have provided us with all of the information requested. If you can’t provide all the information for some reason, contact us for advice
• complete and return the documents by the date and time given. Check that you have signed everything you should have
• make sure you haven't included publicity or promotional material in your submission unless you are asked to
• keep electronic copies of all submissions. You will be able to cut and paste your answers into future councils' Supplier Selection Questionnaires and Invitation to Tenders and save time

Where a contract is procured on the Chest, a simple question and answer function allows you to raise questions, with the answer then being copied to all interested parties.