Para 7.5.3 — GOODS_MANUAL

4. If stipulated in the Tender Document, in the case of Vehicles, Machine Tools, Information Technology Products, OEM/ specialised equipment, and their spares/consumables and similar other such products, where the design feature, performance parameters, etc. of such products/ goods or services differ significantly among the products of different manufacturers and even between different models of the same manufacturer and where equitable comparison of prices of such products or services is not feasible, Rate Contracts may be concluded on %age rebate on Net Dealer Price (NDP) or MRP basis, generally known as Catalogue basis.

5. Period of Rate Contract: A Rate Contract shall be for the period specified in the tender document (or one year if not so specified).

7.5.3 Evaluation in Rate Contracts 1. If stipulated in the Tender Documents that this is a Tender Process to enter “Rate Contract(s)” for the supply of Goods, then additional clauses (including Performance Security, Fall Clause, etc) shall be incorporated therein, and the evaluation would be done accordingly (please refer to para 4.4.1-3 above). 2. Procedures stipulated in this chapter for evaluation of bids and award of contract shall be applicable mutatis mutandis in the finalisation of rate contract. The procedure for negotiations/counter-offers and splitting of contracts (parallel contracts) is slightly different in Rate Contract as per sub-para below. One-time or standing approval of the Secretary of the Department may be taken for this procedure. 3. Procuring Entity reserves the right to conclude more than one rate contract for the same Schedule/ Goods. The procedure for negotiation and counter-offering for concluding parallel rate contracts could be as follows. a) Initially, the rate contract would be awarded to the L-1 Bidder. Then the price of L-1 shall be counter-offered to the higher quoting responsive Bidders (under intimation to L-1), asking them to send their revised Bids online on the e-procurement portal to be opened at a specified place, date, and time (as per the standard procedure). L-1 Bidder would be specifically informed that it may, if it desires, reduce its price, and send its revised bid accordingly. The Bidders who accept the counter-offered rate or rate lower than that would be awarded parallel rate contracts. If L-1 Bidder lowers its rate in its revised offer, the same would also be accepted with effect from that date, and its rate contract would be amended accordingly. b) Price Negotiation with the bidders should be severely discouraged. However, in the case where parallel rate contracts are necessary, even if the lowest responsive bidder (L-1) price is not reasonable, negotiation may be conducted with the L-1 bidder in the first instance. If the L1 Bidder agrees to bring down the price to the desired level, a rate contract would be concluded with it, and parallel rate contracts would be concluded as per the sub-para above. If, however, L1 Bidder does not agree to reduce its price in the first instance itself, then the price, which has been decided as reasonable, shall be counter-offered to all the higher quoting responsive Bidders (including L-1) for further action on the above lines. c) All such parallel rate contracts would be released transparently and simultaneously.

Table 2. Indicative time schedule

Deliberations by the Tender Committee for Award of Contract. 7.6.1 Timely Processing of Tenders (Rule 174

(i) of GFR 2017)

S.N. Mode of Procurement Indigenous Imported 1 Open tender/ (e-tendering) 45days 60 days 2 Procurement through registered vendors/ (Special) limited tenders 30 days 45days 3 Proprietary basis/nomination basis 21days 30 days

Delays in finalising procurement deprive the public of the intended benefits and result in lost revenues and costs over-run. To enable timely decision-making, a complete time schedule for finalising the tender process from the date of issuing the tender to the date of issuing the contract should be published in the tender documents. Every official in the chain of the procurement operation is accountable for acting within the time-schedule so that the tender is finalised on time. Any deviation from the schedule may be monitored and explained by way of a system of Management Reporting (Appendix 4 and 5). As a check, the proposed schedule of the tender process may be printed on the inside cover of the Procurement File, where the actual date of completion of various stages may be recorded. The suggestive time schedule in Table 2 is a guideline for finalising contracts against various modes of procurements.

This time schedule is only indicative, and the schedule shall be subject to change based on the nature of requirements, sourcing, sample evaluation, site visit/pre-bid meeting with prospective bidders and Government, guidelines, and so on.