4.5 Sealed Bids

In a sealed bid, each supplier sends one quotation. No one sees any quotation, staff included, until the opening committee opens them together. This gives you a fair, tender-style process with a clear record of who opened what and when.

Opening Committees

Create committees under Sourcing → Bidding → RFQ Opening Committee.

When a sealed RFQ is submitted, each committee member is assigned a task to open it.

Opening Conditions

By default, quotations open only when all of these are true:

1. Bids closed: the Bids Close At time has passed.
2. Minimum quotations received: at least the RFQ's Minimum Expected Quotations have arrived.
3. Every committee member confirmed: each member has clicked Open Quotes.

You can relax each condition for all sealed bids in Sourcing Settings → Bidding.

Opening the Quotations

1. A committee member opens the submitted RFQ. The Committee Opening section shows each condition as Met, Waiting or Not required.
2. When the member is allowed to confirm, the Open Quotes button appears. Click it.
3. When the last required confirmation is in, the quotations open. Quotations Opened is ticked and the confirmations are recorded with each member's name and time.

After Opening

• The Supplier Quotations become visible in Desk and can be submitted.
• Once they are submitted, award the RFQ. See Awarding Suppliers.