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ESPD – WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW – European single procurement document

Posted on by John Hudson

ESPD – WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW – European single procurement document

ESPD & Procurement policy – not the most known or thrilling of topics. We know that reviewing changes does not exactly make for riveting reading, so we have condensed this information into what you actually need to know.

Due to the European Public Procurement Reform which kicked off in April 2016, one of the key elements featured was the introduction of the ESPD (European Single Procurement Document).

What is an ESPD?

An ESPD is an online electronic form that any supplier can complete, download and submit as part of their bid for a growing number of public procurement agencies, both nationally and internationally.

Access to the form can be found HERE.

As part of the reform, this process simplifies cross-border procurement, cuts down on paperwork, and helps provide access to new opportunities for businesses of all sizes.

The procurement policy remains the same as a pre-qualification questionnaire stage (or PQQ for short), where buyers can assess your response to specific criteria to determine the capability of your delivery in order to be invited to tender (ITT).

CLICK HERE for further information about the PQQ process.

What does an ESPD include?

This contains all of the similar exclusion criteria and selection criteria that enables your company to subsequently be invited to tender (ITT), which remains from the prior PQQ document. It’s the YES/NO questions that ensure you are an upstanding member of the national business community and are not faulting in certain areas, such as criminal convictions, tax evasion, fraud etc.

The biggest new element is the idea of self-certification. During our team’s procurement careers, what happened in the past was that on a typical PQQ, you had to attach endless amounts of financial accounts and policies. Now, as per the reform and introduction of an ESPD, you must self-certify that you maintain all this documentation and provide the evidence later at any time. So, make sure you have your policies and financial documents in place, ready to attach when prompted by the buyer.

How does it affect you?

 This has been put in place to ensure that you don’t need to keep completing the same old questionnaire time and time again. Many buyers now will ask you if you have completed this generic document and you can attach this in order to save time (see example below).

Procurement Policy
ESPD & Procurement Policy

One thing to remember is the Technical & Professional Capability section as part of the PQQ (or Selection Questionnaire-SQ). You must adapt this for every contract, because no two contracts are the same and you’ll need to show off your technical capability and experience in different ways, for different previous contract examples. Make sure this is adjusted based on the new contract requirements at hand.

Other than this, this affects you minimally. If you have tendered before you’ll be used to the questions asked here – it’s purpose is merely to make it simpler and save you time.

We are here to help you SUCCEED

Get in touch with our Tender Consultants for more information

TENDERS & BUYER PRESENTATIONS – TOP 3 BENEFITS OF ATTENDING A SITE VISIT

Posted on by John Hudson

TENDERS & BUYER PRESENTATIONS – TOP 3 BENEFITS OF ATTENDING A SITE VISIT

It’s an obvious analogy: The bigger tenders are – the more effort that is required from both the supplier and buyer!

We’ve been to hundreds of site visits and buyer presentations to know that this is a crucial part of tenders and how they are developed.

Buyer presentations are delivered usually halfway through the Tender exercise and they provide all tenderers/suppliers the opportunity to get to know the buyer’s environment and culture, as well as a more detailed outlook on the requirements at hand.

This is usually for large-scale public-sector contracts. 

The buyer invites all suppliers to a site visit, which may include a group tour or a group presentation. This is to provide suppliers with a better opportunity to comprehend what’s expected of them during delivery and with developing their tender response.

We’ve provided our top 3 benefits in attending a buyer presentation/site visit.

  1. To comprehend – sometimes it takes more than a specification document to truly understand what’s expected – especially in a large, multi-million-pound contract that spans multiple regions. As you can expect, with undergoing these types of visits, online clarification questions are often decreased as all aspects will be clarified on the day. Yes – the buyer should make this public to all tenderers, but we’ve found that you’ll tend to grasp more out of the day rather than on a paper-reflected document. Whole conversations aren’t recorded and provided, so there will always be something (possibly crucial) that may be missed on paper, but clear on the day.

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  1. To introduce yourself – by getting your face in front of the buyer[s] – this not only introduces yourself to them but if you display strong professionalism, knowledge and decorum – this will also stick in their minds. If you send your administrator on the day who’s clueless about your operations – and this is clearly projected – the buyer will consider your organisation less committed to the project and you don’t want to be remembered for that. Choose your most knowledgeable staff to attend who you know will act professionally and come back with a steered view of how better to develop your tender response and leave a lasting impression on the buyer.

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  1. To stay ahead of your competitors – now we aren’t one for shaming our competitors – no matter how subtle. However, if you attend grouped discussions you’ll see exactly who your competition is. This provides in many ways a more competitive Tender process as you should be trying to enhance your response based on advantages over your counterparts. For example: If Company X is present and they deliver a certain way – you can always state how your delivery model provides much more added value to the buyer. Don’t go naming and shaming in your response – keep it classy and always have the buyer’s needs in mind!

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These are just some of the things that make attendance at a site visit crucial when developing your tender response.

If you require any support at all with the development of your tenders – please get in touch with our Tender Consultants who’ll be happy to assist you in your efforts.

CLICK HERE for a FREE Consultation.

We’re here to help you succeed!

TUPE – WHAT IS IT & HOW DOES IT AFFECT YOU?

Posted on by John Hudson

TUPE – WHAT IS IT & HOW DOES IT AFFECT YOU?

I know what some of you are thinking – what on earth is TUPE?

One thing we are not here to do, is provide you a whole lot of legal jargon surrounding compliance and adherence to specific laws. This blog focuses on the basics of TUPE and how this applies to suppliers who are tendering!

TUPE is an abbreviation of Transfer of Undertakings Protection of Employment.

This is commonly used in a range of industries and rarely used in others, however we still think this is useful to comprehend, as this is widely considered across many UK tenders.

Let’s give you an example:

So, Bill, Bob and Ben are all IT Technicians for a local council on behalf of Company X.

Company Y has just won the tender to provide the IT Technical Solutions Contract over a 5-year period for this local council, meaning Company X will no longer provide the services.

To ensure Bill, Bob and Ben are not made redundant or out of work due to supplier changeover, the local council has stipulated that TUPE will apply as part of Company Y’s contract win.

Company Y must then liaise with Bill, Bob and Ben and ensure their transfer from Company X over to Company Y goes without a hitch. They undergo company consultations and inductions and ensure a fair and transparent process is followed, which complies with regulations.

Make sense? – it’s basically a procedure, governed by law, to move employees and any liabilities associated with them from an old employer to a new employer, and when it comes to procurement and supplier changeover, TUPE can be rife!

How does it affect you?

Again, this is used dominantly in some sectors, whilst rarely used in others. You may find you may never have to deal with TUPE. But it’s always good to be aware of what to expect.

The likes of Engineering, Technology, Construction, Utilities, Manufacturing and Logistics, where continuous delivery/support is required with certain buyers from grass-root operatives, means TUPE majorly applies to ensure employees of Company A can continue to work on contracts when Company B takes over.

If TUPE does apply and you have to inherit one or more employees as part of the contract-win, you’ll have to consider multiple things regarding the management of TUPE as per your tender response.

What you should do:

  • Assess the TUPE database! – this may be on a spreadsheet or a similar information sheet – make sure full assessment is made on this. This should detail employee liabilities, such as sick pay, holiday pay, etc. This is where the most basic details of the employee come to light, so you can ensure you can afford the staff you may potentially inherit.
  • Price Correctly! – use the details of all TUPE staff (acquired from the database/information sheet) to ensure you are taking into account clear variances in your pricing model. You, as Company 2 may pay your staff a specific amount, but Company 1 may pay them a lot differently. Take this into consideration.
  • Understand your responsibilities! – do you need to contact the new employees directly or will the buyer bridge this relationship initially? – Understand what you need to do when it comes to managing TUPE staff.
  • Get Help! – in your tender response, if there are any questions on TUPE management, state how you’ll use a reputable and fully qualified legal service for support, advice and guidance to ensure full complicity against the regulations.

If you’re struggling with the mind field that can be TUPE regulations and require some support with your tender management approach, GET IN TOUCH TODAY! Our Tender Consultants are always here to help you understand, prepare and succeed!

How about discovering those all-important opportunities where TUPE may or may not apply? Our Tender Connect service, offers 10-industry-specific platforms providing you will both Public AND Private opportunities across your sector.

WHAT IS A DYNAMIC PURCHASING SYSTEM? The DPS in Tendering!

Posted on by John Hudson

WHAT IS A DYNAMIC PURCHASING SYSTEM? The DPS in Tendering!

Here we go again – another term which is not well known in all industry sectors across the UK – a Dynamic Purchasing System.

As always, we are here to help you understand all these ‘niggly’ bits to tendering, to ensure you are prepared to undergo some serious business development planning across your sector and beyond!

You can see the different bidding terminologies applicable in our ‘Tendering doesn’t have to be complicated’ blog. 

In a nutshell – a Dynamic Purchasing System (or DPS for short) is basically a supply chain list where tenders or other bidding opportunities are published to specific members that have been successful in maintaining a position on that list.

As quoted in the Public Contracts Regulations 2015, “[a] DPS should be set up for identified types of requirement, which may be divided into categories of products, works or services.”

This could be any organisation or group of organisations, who wants to outsource work in either one or more service areas [or LOTs] and rather than having 50-100 applications come through for the [potentially many] tenders they publish, they start by narrowing down a set-list of applicants onto their own DPS.

Differences between Dynamic Purchasing System & General Tender processes

The main differences from the typical tender process are that a DPS is to:

  • be run as a completely electronic process (no paper or posting required here)
  • allow new suppliers to join at any time (meaning that if you have been unsuccessful at securing a place – you can always try again in the future)
  • and show longevity in its run (we’ve come across DPS’s which are open for 10 or more years)

All that suppliers would need to do, is register their company onto this DPS online, click which service area they are interested in delivering and undergo a Stage 1 submission in order to secure a place. Once secured, Stage 2 is the actual tendering of the works in question.

For example – A Housing Association could create a DPS for their outsourced Creative activity, which includes a range of service areas/LOTs – i.e. Branding, Printing, Website Hosting etc. They would publish this DPS opportunity to all and then undergo multiple stages to narrow down the process of awarding the work via the ‘most economically advantageous tender’ (MEAT).

Stage 1

In the average UK tender process, a lot of suppliers may be asked to complete a Pre-qualification Questionnaire (PQQ) to help the buyer narrow down their list of Invitations to Tender (ITT). This is now being taking over by a ‘Selection Questionnaire’ on many portals. It’s similar with a DPS – the supplier has to get onto the DPS in order to be Invited to Tender for works and they do this by completing a Stage 1 application process that heavily resembles a PQQ, with maybe a few additional questions thrown in.

Like a typical PQQ-to-ITT process, securing access to the DPS reflects a ‘weed-out’ procedure, with the buyer ensuring they progress all applicants who demonstrate greater strengths in their financial, technical and professional capabilities.

Stage 2

Once you are successful and Stage 1 is complete – it is complete. You do not have to re-do any capability and competency-based questions. Every time a tender is published in relation to your service area, as part of this Dynamic Purchasing System, you are automatically invited to tender and answer all questions specific to that service!

Once on the DPS then a range of tenders will then ensue (as and when required), allowing the buyer to streamline a more technically-focused evaluation on the responses collated.

Where we stand in all of this!

Our Tender Connect platform, which will be launching within the next 12-months, has many traits of a Dynamic Purchasing System, in that a buyer, let’s, for example, say a Design agency on our Creative Tenders portal, seeks a professional company who can support their financial/accountancy needs. All that the Design agency would do is:

  • Log on to Tender Connect
  • View a list of our Professional Tenders subscribers, which encapsulates a large list of Accountancy firms
  • Publish their ‘private opportunity brief’ to a filtered list of suppliers
  • Receive responses, evaluate and award

The reason we filter this list is to avoid publishing opportunities that bare minimal relevance to our suppliers. And to streamline the process for our buyers, helping them publish specific competitive opportunities to the most competent suppliers.

So, if you ever come across a DPS that contains services specific to your offering – get on board.

Our Tender Consultants can help you succeed!

Focused growth continues at Creative Tenders

Posted on by John Hudson

Focused growth continues at Creative Tenders

Creative Tenders are growing once again with their latest recruit, an MBA graduate from Durham University.

Adhitya Vohra has joined Creative Tenders for a 3-month project looking at how the business will successfully launch the Creative Tenders product into international markets. The project is a critical step to forecasting how the management team will dominate the tendering market. This is not only in the UK but also internationally.

“We believe that geography should no longer be a factor into where we seek new business or our suppliers. With the ever changing landscape of technology and how we communicate with our clients and suppliers, we can see huge scope in bringing additional work to the UK from other markets” said John Hudson, Managing Director.

“Our marketing director Jill Hudson drives forward this strategy every day. We currently communicate with 850,000 businesses in the UK selling the services of Creative Tenders and Creative Finder. We want to double this within the next 12 months and we will continue to work hard to grow the creative industries” he added.

Jill Hudson added “Adhitya joins us with not only an impressive MBA from Durham University but 4 years professional experience working for organisations like Deutsche Bank and Citicoro Services India. He officially starts in our company on the 11th July 2016 and we are looking forward to seeing the end result and being able to drive forward our international strategy”.

WE SOURCE CREATIVE CONTRACT OPPORTUNITIES FOR;

Book a free live demo with Creative Tenders to see how we can help your business grow. 

Creative Tenders – Officially launched – Website, Design & Marketing Tenders all in one place!

Posted on by John Hudson

Creative Tenders – Officially launched – Website, Design & Marketing Tenders all in one place!

The day has finally arrived, and the team at Creative Tenders couldn’t he happier. Creative Tenders officially launched.

We are now open for business. We have proactive marketing campaigns running in parallel recruiting new creative sign ups and new private sector opportunities onto our system. We have streamlined processes where we check over 1,000 tender websites daily to locate 100% of tenders available online that are relevant to creative sector businesses only, meaning two things you won’t miss a single tender, and you won’t need to search through hundreds of irrelevant tenders to find opportunities suitable for your business.

The system is running a start up cost of £12 per week for agencies and £6 per week for freelancers, but this cost is only for the first 100 registrations. Following the 100th registration, the full system fee is payable at £18 per week for companies and £12 per week for freelancers. So don’t forget the early bird catches the worm.

Website Tenders Launch

The site officially launched on Tuesday and by Thursday afternoon we saw the registration of our 10th user, and we are overwhelmed by the response from the sector.

If you are interested in seeing a demo of the system, you can organise by this emailing our Director of Sales Andrew Gibson or by phoning our office and speaking with one of our sales representatives.

Thank you for keeping up to date with Creative Tenders, we look forward to helping you grow your agency.

Sign up for a free demo of Creative Tenders and review the following creative contract opportunities:

Book a free live demo with Creative Tenders to see how we can help your business grow. 

 

 

Creative Tenders moves to Durham

Posted on by John Hudson

Creative Tenders moves to Durham

We are excited to announce that Creative Tenders will be moving to Durham in April 2016 to support its bid for high growth. The growing software company will be moving to the prestigious business park – City West at Meadowfield in Durham after signing a five-year lease for 1,600 square foot.

Managing Director John Hudson said “we are very excited to move the business to Durham. The new office space allows us to grow massively and will support with finding the right team, with the right experience to lead our business to become the leading creative tendering portal across the UK”.

He went on to say “if you are looking for a new challenge then Creative Tenders could be the business for you. We have a full list of open vacancies on our website ranging from sales executives to account managers”.

Creative Tenders Portal

The product is due to go live in February and the team believes that it’s the start of something very exciting for the creative industries. The team will launch UK wide from day one and Directors Jill and John a husband and wife team has heavily invested into the business and its product development.

Jill said “I have worked in the creative sector my whole career, and I always knew I wanted to streamline the way new business was secured, as no matter what agency I worked with they struggled to find quality leads and new business opportunities”

“Our new team will be forward thinking experienced sales and marketing representatives from the creative sector and will drive forward the agencies that sign up to our product. Following the signing of the new office lease we have everything we need to build a leading brand”.

We welcome feedback on our product so please contact Jill Hudson – jill@creativetenders.co.uk to discuss our business further.

Sign up for a free demo of Creative Tenders and review the following creative contract opportunities:

 

 

 

Struggling to win website tenders?

Posted on by John Hudson

Struggling to win website tenders?  Would you like us to provide feedback on your website tender submission?

Are you struggling to win public tenders, or even be shortlisted when submitting proposals? Isn’t it annoying?

We have produced a blog previously about the importance of gathering feedback, but some feedback isn’t actually that helpful. For example, the client may say – cost. Well that’s helpful isn’t it?

Tender writing is an art form.

Tender writing is an art form. Once you’ve got a formula that works for you, you’re onto a winner. No, that doesn’t mean you will win everything you go for, but it does mean that you are presenting your business in the best possible light, answering the questions that are asked of you, rather than telling them information you believe to be important and sometimes realising that less is more.

For those of you struggling to win bids, it’s sometimes good to get an outside perspective. This is what we launched Creative Growth. We work with creative agencies to help them become bid ready. We can usually see from an initial tender review where you might be going wrong and we can help you to reduce the number of common mistakes you ate making.

Free tender review service.

Throughout the next 12 weeks, Creative Growth is offering member companies of Creative Tenders access to a free tender review service. We will critique one of your recent tenders that has not been successful and provider pointers for improved success. What’s not to love about this?

If you would like us to critique one of your tenders, you need to send us the ITT in full (including all of the supporting documents) and your response (in full, including appendices). Once we have this we will get our review complete with 14 days and offer a telephone advice session about what you need to be to be 100% tender ready.

Please send all documents including the reference GROWTH21 to jill@creativetenders.co.uk.

 

Sign up for a free demo of Creative Tenders and review the following opportunities:

Event Tenders

Website Tenders

Printing Tenders

Video Production Tenders & many more.

 

 

Meet the Team – Creative Tenders – The Tendering Website for the Creative Sector

Posted on by John Hudson

Meet the Team – Creative Tenders – The Tendering Website for the Creative Sector

Meet the Creative Tenders Management Team

We are thrilled to have our full management team in place now at Creative Tenders. Meet the members of our team below.

Meet Jill

Jill has worked in the creative sector her whole career spanning 16 years. She has secured millions in business for the agencies she has worked with, managed teams of up to 30 creative lead generators and managed creative and digital contracts up to 500k in value. Jill’s role at Creative Tenders is Director of Marketing and she will be responsible for marketing to creative companies encouraging them to use of our system, but also non-creative businesses looking for creative, digital and marketing providers.

You can contact Jill by emailing jill@creativetenders.co.uk

Meet John

John has worked in the creative sector his whole career since starting his first business when he was just 19 at university. He has successfully grown and sold several of his own creative and digital ventures, has a BA in TV and Radio and a MA in Media. John owns Creative Tenders and takes the role of overall business management, recruitment and retention, HR and accounts.

You can contact John by emailing john@creativetenders.co.uk

Meet Kathryn

Kathryn has worked with the management team at Creative Tenders for 7 years and is passionate, energetic and creative. She has a BA in Theatre and an MA in Media. Kathryn’s role is Head of Creative and is responsible for the brand management and overall look and feel of our communications, including our website, video content and designed promotional materials

If you think you’ve got what it takes to work for Creative Tenders, send us your CV to jill@creativetenders.co.uk

Sign up for a free demo of Creative Tenders and review the following creative contract opportunities:

 

Key factors of writing a winning tender

Posted on by John Hudson

Key factors of writing a winning tender

Writing bids may be a laborious task. I have written so many over the course of my career and on occasion I have been fed up with them.
Continue reading “Key factors of writing a winning tender”

The importance of receiving tender / proposal feedback on Graphic Design Tenders

Posted on by John Hudson

The importance of receiving tender / proposal feedback on Graphic Design Tenders

It’s disappointment when we receive the unwanted email from those companies we have tendered for, and sometimes more than others. But why is this?
Continue reading “The importance of receiving tender / proposal feedback on Graphic Design Tenders”