Notes for owners · Sales management
Tender and RFP responses for IT firms: what to bid on and what to skip
A bid or no-bid test for IT firms in India: eligibility, references, the buyer's evaluation method and your own capacity, so that effort goes to tenders you can win and the rest are skipped.
The GullySales team · Updated 17 Oct 2026 · 6 min read
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The tender notice for cabling a district's government offices lands on a Friday, and your owner says "we can manage". An IT firm should bid only when it meets the eligibility terms with its own documents and has a reference the buyer can check. It must also understand the scoring and have people free to deliver. Anything short of that should usually be a skip. A response eats days of your best people's time, so the bid decision deserves a written test before the first page is drafted.
What is a bid or no-bid test?
It is a half-page checklist, filled in by two people, which ends in one word: bid or skip. Doing it on paper stops enthusiasm from deciding. Here is a version.
- Eligibility. Do we meet each pass-or-fail condition today with a document in hand? Turnover, years in business, registrations, experience of a similar job. A "nearly" counts as a no, unless the tender lets a partner supply the missing experience and one has agreed in writing.
- Reference. Do we have a finished job of a similar kind and size, with a client contact who will take a call?
- Scoring. Is the award based on price alone, or on a mix of technical score and price? How is each weighted?
- Scope clarity. Can we state in two sentences what we are being asked to deliver, and what is excluded?
- Capacity. If we win, who delivers it, and what do they stop doing?
- Payment. What are the payment terms, and can we carry the cost until we are paid?
- Relationship. Did we know about this buyer before the tender appeared?
Two skips (eligibility or reference) end the matter unless a partner can close the gap within the tender's rules. A bid with five yeses and two doubts goes to the owner for a decision.
Which tenders are worth a response?
| Kind of tender | Bid when | Skip when |
|---|---|---|
| Price-only award (lowest bidder wins) | Your cost is genuinely lowest for this scope | You would win only by pricing under cost |
| Quality-and-cost scoring | You can show a strong reference and a clear method | Your references are all unlike the work |
| Rate contract for supplies or support | You can service the sites it covers | Sites are spread where you have no engineer |
| Large turnkey project | You can partner for the part you lack, within the rules | Eligibility needs a track record you do not have |
| Re-tender of work you already support | You hold the facts the others lack | The buyer plainly wants to change the vendor |
Rules on joint bids, partner experience and documents differ by buyer and change, so read each tender and take advice where unsure.
How do you read a tender fast?
Read the eligibility clause and the evaluation method first, before the scope. If you fail the first, the second does not matter. Then read the payment terms, the penalty clauses and the validity period. Many firms read the technical scope with care and miss that payment is due long after delivery.
Mark every document the tender asks for in a table: the document, the date it expires, who has it. Missing a signed form or an expired certificate rejects a bid on technical grounds even when your price wins. Our post on a document pack for vendor registration lists what to keep ready.
Case: a Nagpur networking firm and the district offices
Say an invented networking firm in Nagpur sees that cabling tender. It needs the work and has no big reference. The team spends nine days on the response, including one late night over the commercial sheet.
Nobody ran the test, and it would have taken ten minutes. Eligibility asked for one completed job above a stated value in recent years, and the firm's largest was well under it. The bid is thrown out at the first stage. Nobody reads the nine days of effort.
Run the half page and the picture changes. Question 1 fails on its face. But the owner reads on and finds the tender allows a partner's experience within stated limits. The owner rings a firm that has done such jobs, agrees a written division of work, and makes sure the paperwork names both. Questions 2 to 7 are then answerable and the firm bids, with a clear role for each. It still loses, to a bidder about twelve percent lower, but it learns the winning price and has a partner for the next tender. Had the partner said no, the nine days would have gone into a quotation for a private buyer.
What goes into a response that scores well?
Answer what is asked, in the order it is asked, using the buyer's own headings. Make it easy for a scorer with a checklist to tick each item. Put the reference first in the technical section, with the contact. Describe your method for this scope, not your company's history. Keep a clear table of who does what and when.
Ask pre-bid questions where the scope is vague, and keep a copy of the answers you receive. A good question is narrow and quotes the clause: "Clause 4.2 lists 'all offices'. Please confirm whether the 14 sub-offices on Annexure B are included." After the result, ask for feedback if the process allows; a lost bid with a reason is worth more than a lost bid without one. Our guide on being found by tender buyers deals with the stage before a tender appears.
When to skip every tender for a while
If your team is already stretched on live projects, a tender response will damage both. If your documents are not in order, fix them first. And if the only tenders you pass are ones where price alone decides, consider a different route to the same buyers, such as vendor registration and direct relationships.
Run the seven questions on a tender you passed
Take the last tender you were tempted by and put the seven questions to it. Answer strictly, and count a "nearly" as a no. Keeping the test and the documents ready is the work of RFP and tender management, and other work for software and IT firms is under technology. If you have a live tender, tell us what you need.
