Public Sector Procurement Rant!!

[MuchasSmoochas]

Anybody else killing themselves responding to invitations to tender and finding it’s not worth it? Or is it just me. I’d say at least half of them are fixed before it even goes out to tender. Am coming round to the opinion that if the tenderer doesn’t get in touch with you before the process there’s no point. Sorry I know this is v niche.

What are you trying to sell to them? At least if you do get 'in' you know your invoice will be paid.

It's all so heavily weighted on price. I've worked on both sides provider and commissioner, it irks me that providers have to jump through all these hoops but at the end of the day 90% of the time the lowest bidder prevails. Are you tendering for large contracts or is it a DPS system?

I've worked on the commissioner side, and yes the amount of pre-work required is jaw dropping. But it usually boils down to most economicallly advantageous tender. With some contracts they go out on a lower value than it's possible to provide the service (care contracts I'm looking at you!) - but then add that they expect an "innovative" approach to make up the shortfall.

What areas are you submitting? There is a dark art to responses, and it's worth researching if it's just going to be going to the incumbent.

@MuchasSmoochas It’s extremely difficult to get listed and even when you’re on, there’s no guarantee you’ll be chosen. An awful lot of places order cheap goods which come with a free £1M machine, that you’re not in a position to offer.

Do you only supply the public sector? Private sector doesn't have all the onerous process and bigger freedom to make decisions

Ooh thanks everyone for responding I missed this!! Especially to @PerfidiousAlbion for tagging me. It’s all public sector. Was really hacked off as I spent three days responding to an ITT then I saw on the suppliers news feed that they had awarded the contract before the bloody procurement!! Complained anonymously to the Public Procurement Watchdog who wrote to them and they said oh it was an error. Then just last week I heard back about a tender, didn’t win, that’s the way it goes however I can see the award was £7k more than mine yet I was marked down on cost. It’s a bloody fix and a waste of time unless you’ve been tipped the wink.

It’s consulting services, all under 25k @topcat2014