A Point of Contact within the Government Entity shall be designated for receiving the bids from interested Bidders on or before the stated date. The two envelopes containing the technical and financial proposals, respectively, should be received and kept separately. If bids are opened upon submission, it must be ensured that the guidelines provided in the Tender document(s) have been strictly adhered to, and that Bidders are made aware of potential disqualification as soon as possible.
Following evaluation of the bids, the Government Entity shall invite the preferred Bidder to finalise the terms of the contract, which should take into account both the ToR and the submitted markup of the draft contract as part of the winning bid.
It should be made clear that the Government Entity holds the right to negotiate pricing with the Preferred Bidder, and, failing the achievement of a consensus, is permitted to begin conducting negotiations with the next highest scoring Bidder. In that case, the lead Bidder will be informed in advance and in writing of why they are not eligible to continue negotiations anymore.
After the successful completion of negotiations with the preferred Bidder, the parties should successfully agree and write down terms and sign the contract. As a last step in the process, unsuccessful Bidders should be informed of the decision.