Sixfold has been called in to help a large company resolve a strange issue with the evaluation of its multi-million pound tender. The company had been told that it had come second and, in accordance with the procurement requirements, it was sent the scores both it and the winning bidder had been allocated.
However, on examination it was uncovered that the Public Sector evaluation team had added an additional step into the calculation of the quality score. It had normalised the scores in the same manner that the financial score was normalised. The problem was that this quality normalisation process was not included in the Instructions to Tenderers. The financial normalisation process was there, but the quality normalisation was not! Moreover, the normalisation process altered the ranking of Sixfold’s client from first place to second. Once the “normalisation” was removed, our client had won!
Sixfold advised the client on the strategy for the debriefing meeting which it had applied for as part of the Alcatel process and then attended the debrief with the client’s team. The Public Sector team was stunned when its misappropriation of the process was highlighted, but refused to accept that its process was faulty. Sixfold drafted the formal challenge to the decision processes and the final decision. We await with interest the outcome, which we will post here once we know it.
