Our client is a construction contractor specialising in education, commercial and healthcare refurbishment and refits, looking for support with a complex tender submission. The contracting authority, a local council, was looking to adapt an existing school to build an extension for children with special education needs.
Although our client was confident in their ability to deliver the works to the required scope and specification, they had struggled with producing high-quality, competitive responses to public sector tender submissions in the past and reached out to us for support. With over 7,000 SQ, PQQ and ITT submissions supported on behalf of clients and an 85% success rate, we were ideally positioned to meaningfully add value to the client’s bid.
Project overview
The project comprised 6,250 words across seven responses and method statements, with the quality element weighted at 100% for this stage. The second stage invited the three highest-scoring bidders to a pricing exercise, with the candidate submitting the lowest price awarded the contract.
Upon agreement and instruction to proceed, Ciaran Brass was assigned to lead the project, with Ewan Weston working in support. Following a review of the specification, question set and tender annexes (including floor plans, asbestos surveys and drawing registers), Ciaran produced a detailed answer plan and structure to support the client interview, held via MS Teams. The client interview addressed key themes and topics covered as part of responses, with Ciaran ensuring open-ended questions were included to avoid an overly narrow focus.
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Geographical region:
Yorkshire & The Humber
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Output:
6,250 words across six quality responses and method statements
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Weighting:
100% quality (price evaluated between the three highest-scoring bidders at final stage)
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Submission:
Electronic and portal-based
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Outcome:
Successful.
Main challenges
The question set consisted entirely of backward-facing, experience-based questions addressing the specific challenges and constraints of the project.
As such, some key challenges to the tender included:
- Aligning previous experience with the buyer’s requirements, positioning them as the ideal candidate to complete the works
- Producing detailed, persuasive and evidence-based case studies around highly specific topics
- Addressing complex topics, including health and safety in a live school site, site and phasing coordination and working in an environment with known risk of asbestos.
Topics in the question set included:
- Two case studies demonstrating the client’s technical and professional ability, which must have had a minimum value of £2 million and were of a similar nature and technical complexity
- Health and safety experience in a comparable live site with restricted areas and how the client managed risks, health and safety, safeguarding and environmental issues
- A previous project where asbestos was present on the site and how risk of disturbance was mitigated during planning, coordination and completion stages
- Experience in managing and coordinating phased projects, addressing details around shared sites, completion/handover of individual phases, and measures for assisting and coordinating with the client and other stakeholders.
Our client was able to provide crucial details regarding each of the previous projects, including sending across previous documentation – such as construction phase plans – to ensure responses were highly specific and targeted.
Following the interview and receipt of documentation, Ciaran and Ewan wrote each response in accordance with our house style, effectively breaking down the question into constituent parts to ensure a comprehensive response.
Each response was subject to line-by-line quality review in conjunction with the specification and wider tender documents, ensuring relevant, highly targeted content. Responses were returned to Ciaran and Ewan suggesting further amendments or enhancements to ensure the strongest possible submission.
Ciaran and Ewan then sent copies of responses to our CIEP-accredited external proofreading team, with final drafts passed on to the client for them to review and approve. Following approval, Ciaran supported the client in collating and finalising all tender documents, in addition to uploading these to the tender portal.
Outcome
Six months after the submission, our client informed us they were successfully awarded the contract and were anticipating taking possession of the site in a few weeks’ time. With nearly half of the responses receiving the maximum marks from the authority, they were delighted with the quality of bid management support received and have since gone on to become valued repeat clients.