How does Four’s tender management system work?
Paper-based tender management systems take up disproportionate amounts of time and energy. Four offers contract lifecycle and tender management software that work hand-in-hand, making life easier and more successful for everyone.
Our tender management process
Business prepares a bid/tender for the product or service
- Creates a tender management record with tracking fields
- Assigns the responsible individuals (department and employee)
- Upload related documents and files (RFP documents, requirements)\Workflow tasks and alerts assigned (early e-mail and calendars)
- Authorised users can access, review, approve, modify documents before release to respondents (suppliers/bidders)
Business releases RFx and related files to the public tendering site
- Public documents attached and marked as public
- Option: assign interested respondents
- Option: send group e-mail notices to respondents
- Personnel may respond to questions, post answers, and mark as public if needed
Option: potential respondents review posted bid opportunities
- Respondents view solicitation posting summary via the Tender Management Portal/Gateway
- Respondents may download/view files
- Respondents may log in to respond, or post a bid
Respondents log in and prepare their response
- Respondents may download/view related files
- Respondents may ask questions
- Respondents may add themselves as an interested party
- Respondents may review questions and answers that are posted
- Respondents may upload their prepared response and files prior to close
- Respondents may upload their prepared response and files prior to close
Business reviews and scores qualified respondents
- Rate and score respondents
- Perform follow-up communication internally and externally
- Create a contract record from the solicitation
- Make a selection or award
Contract personnel create and manage the contract
- Review the contract record
- Track important data fields about the contract
- Track important workflow tasks and approval alerts (e-mail/calendar)
- Track and/or draft contract from template (with merging fields, version tracking)
- Upload external files and documents (with date/time/user/version tracking)
- Track costs
- Create and manage post signature tasks (alerts, notifications, reminders)
- Perform supplier/contract ratings (and monitor performance alerts)
Helpful Information
What is an RFP?
A request for proposal (RFP) is a document that solicits a proposal, often made through a bidding process, by an agency or company interested in procurement of a commodity, service, or valuable asset, to potential suppliers to submit business proposals.
What is an RFX?
“RfX” is a collective term for business invitation processes such as a request for information (RFI), request for proposal (RFP), or request for quotation (RFQ).