A tender is put out when large-scale buyers advertise their needs and invite bids or tenders from a range of suppliers. Put simply, a tender /bid/request for proposal (RFP) is an offer in writing to carry out work or to supply goods/services at a certain price. Things to keep in mind when applying for a tender: Decide whether you can deliver the goods/service required Take note of the cut off time and submit...

Since 2001 when Tenderscan started, we have received numerous complaints and queries about unfair treatment in the tender process. We have offered advice and launched campaigns over the years in order to foster a fairer tender system, but we realized that the main problem relates to understanding how to take up matters of unfair treatment with the government agencies calling for tenders. These are the core questions...

India’s economic miracle over the past 3 decades is something South Africa is hoping to emulate. This miracle has been ascribed largely to the growth of the IT and BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) sectors, linked to the low cost of labour in India. The American TV sitcom, “Outsourced”, provides a humorous glimpse into the BPO world of call centres, online shopping, etc in Mumbai, India. The Indian...

The first statistical release of South Africa’s Census 2011 has produced some interesting preliminary statistics. To read Census 2011 Statistical Release, please go to: http://www.statssa.gov.za/Publications/P03014/P030142011.pdf Despite the fact that two UCT demography experts, professors Tom Moultrie and Rob Dorrington, cautioned Statistics SA against the publication of the results so quickly, the government...

The demarcation of ward, municipal and provincial boundaries is the function of the Municipal Demarcation Board, which came into being in 1998 in terms of the Municipal Demarcation Act. When Census 2001 was conducted, the first set of municipalities demarcated by the MDB was in place. Since 2001 quite a number of changes in the boundaries of municipalities and provinces have taken place, many from pressure on the ground...

Tenderscan didn’t slumber during the long summer holidays, and apparently neither did ERWAT – State Owned Company: East Rand Water . ERWAT decided that the best time to make a huge tender public was Thursday 20 December, which they published exclusively on their own website, with the compulsory briefing date only 4 days later: on Monday 24th December! This is the offending tender: CREATE AND IMPLEMENT...

Subscribers may have noted that for the past few months we have been displaying the CIDB grading of construction tenders in our database. We implemented this innovation during 2012 in response to requests from subscribers wishing to distinguish construction from other tenders. But the CIDB grading tells us more than that. Over the past 2 decades, in an attempt to reduce the insecurity experienced by government departments...