Tender invitation for software companies to supply new order processing systems essay

1. Background

The Jubilee Motor Company which was established in 1982 specializes in the manufacturing and distribution of various types of vehicle models, as well as spare parts for all products. The company comprises of numerous departments to ensure a smooth and efficient workflow. Customer satisfaction is highly prioritized by the company hence the customer services department offers a range of services to enhance client’s satisfaction after sales. Such services include providing timely response to customer’s feedback and complaints while updating them with the new models and latest offers from the company. The company’s customer service, sales and marketing department make constant use of IT processing system to execute tasks in a chronological and swift manner. However, the IT system that is in use since 2000 is relatively older and also involves high maintenance cost than replacement costs. The present IT system used connects to multiple subsystems which are distributed to the company’s dealers worldwide so as to ensure that orders and customer information is persistently linked with the main system.

2. Invitation to tender

The Jubilee Motor Company invites software companies to offer tender for the design and supply of a new IT processing system according to the specifications provided further in this document. Tenders must be submitted in accordance with the following instructions to the consultants for review to check that the mandatory criterion has been satisfied.

3. Eligibility Criteria

The eligibility will be assessed by a committee comprising of employees from each unit of the company to ensure that all the requirements have been included in the tender documents. In the event of failure of the fulfillment of the four major requisites as discussed below, the tender will be rejected.

Management skills of the IT system

The company has a specific criterion that is required for the IT software system which should represent essential requirements that implements management systems functions during the operation. The IT system needs to be fully equipped with advanced features so as to allow the dealers to efficiently manage the orders in terms of submission, modification and tracking the progress. The IT system shall also enhance the company’s competence to process the orders in a timely manner to facilitate efficient production scheduling. A fundamental requirement of the subsystem is to enable the dealers to keep a vigilant record of vehicles supplied and maintenance and warranty work done on the vehicles. In addition, the system should also include a notification technology that gives dealers the ability to market to the past as well as the present clients. Further a notification should be issued to a customer whose service request had been successfully processed as soon as the service has been done and also automated emails and text messages should be brought in use by the IT system to notify the customers regarding the latest special offers and deals by the company.

Technical capability

The new IT system should contain several subsystems, all of which shall operate independently while remaining relentlessly connected to the main system. Such continuous connection facilitates easy and regular transition of data from the main system. Moreover, it is preferable to keep the subsystems connected to each other in order to augment the communication and coordination among the dealers. In the context of installation utmost care should be exercised that the main system is mounted at the company while the subsystem is established at the respective dealer’s premises. The system shall be competent enough to be installed on all computer devices and run on all operating systems. Automatic data backup provision by the IT system shall be considered as a high quality feature of the system.

Relevant experience

The contractor must have a minimum of 5 years of relevant work experience and skills in designing and managing IT systems. The contractor should to be able to provide an evidence of such experience in addition to concrete proof of previous projects that the contractor has implemented in this field.

Usability

The system should be extremely user friendly as the users who shall be using the system may not have an IT background or could be non native English speakers. Therefore the system should take into consideration the aspects of user interface and user performance.

4. Timescale for the IT System

The contract period shall continue up to 5 years which involves issues relating to complete maintenance and regular relevant updates. Timescale for the project will be divided into three phases i. e. Design, Delivery and Operation that are depicted below.

Timescale

• Within a month after confirmation of contract
• Within two months after design confirmation
• Immediately after delivery

There is more flexibility in the timescale; the company will consider the changes that may happen during the tender processes. Whereas, the bidder shall take into account that the total duration of project should not be exceed 4 months.

5. Methods for changeover to a new system

The company will use a pilot operation method, which means, implementing the new system at a selected site of the company that is the sales department. Sales department is considered for pilot operation due to the urgent need of a new information system in that department. Subsequently, the implementation of the system shall be executed in all the departments.

6. The cost

Indication of the total cost will be presented according to the technical merits of the system that will be provided. However, it is significant to note that the total cost estimate shall be no more than £70. 000. The bidder shall be aware that the company is not responsible for any costs, expenses and liabilities incurred towards the preparation and submission of the tender.

7. Penalty clauses

The entire implementation of the project must be completed in a set time frame and within agreed budget as written into the timescale and cost terms. To achieve this purpose, the company has decided an imposition of a penalty on the contactor in the event of any cost overrun or failure to run the new system on that time or defective performance during implementation phase. If the bidder fails to carry out the work while adhering to the conditions stated in the agreement statement, they will be penalized by adding their overruns percentage to their submitted bid cost. That means, the company will not be responsible for the cost overruns. The bidder will be imposed with the consequent financial brunt associated with the delay and defective performance. However, the bidder will derive a financial benefit of 2% for each 5% saved if the project can be completed below the budget.

8. Implications of new system if the company plans to expand

In the next two years the company plans to expand its business operations into different locations in the UK. Thus, the new main system should have the functional capacity to be installed and operate in multiple geographic locations. This feature is considered as highly desirable.
Changes in the applicable law: If any changes occur after signing a contract which bring about an increase or decrease in the duties or quality concerned, the consequent costs shall be accepted accordingly by an agreement between the parties.