Para 7.4 — NONCONSULT_MANUAL

7.4. Financial Evaluation 7.4.1. General Norms for Ranking of Financial Bids 1. The financial proposals shall be opened publicly (as per para 5.3 mutatis mutandis) witnessed by representatives of the technically qualified service providers who choose to do so. In off-line tenders, the Evaluation Committee demonstrably verifies that the financial proposals have remained sealed and then opens them. 2. For a time-based contract, any arithmetical errors shall be corrected, and prices shall be adjusted if they fail to reflect all inputs that are included in the respective technical proposals. For a lump-sum contract, the bidder is deemed to have included all prices in its/his financial proposal so neither arithmetical correction nor any other price adjustment shall be made. 3. For the purpose of evaluation, the total cost shall include all taxes and duties for which the Procuring Entity makes payments to the service provider and other reimbursable expenses, such as travel, translation, report printing, or secretarial expenses as indicated in the Tender document. 4. Unless otherwise stipulated, the comparison of the responsive Bids shall be on price criteria (except in case of QCBS selection – para 7.4.4 below) i.e., total outgo from the Procuring Entity’s pocket, to be paid to the contractor or any third party, including all elements of costs as per the terms of the proposed contract, including any service charges, insurance, cost of incidental Works/ Goods, taxes, duties, levies etc. Financial Bids of all Techno-commercially suitable bids are evaluated and ranked to determine the lowest priced bidder. 5. Unless otherwise stipulated, if the Schedule of Requirements contains more than one schedule, the financial ranking of bids shall be done based on all schedules put together.

Manual for Procurement of Non-Consultancy Services, 2025 The bid for a schedule shall not be considered if the complete requirements prescribed in that schedule are not included in the bid; 6. If any bidder offers conditional discounts/ rebates in his bid or suo-motu discounts and rebates after the Bid Opening (techno-commercial or financial), such rebates/ discounts shall not be considered for ranking the offer. But if such a bidder does become L-1 without discounts/ rebates, such discounts/ rebates shall be availed and incorporated in the contracts; 7. Unless announced beforehand, the quoted price shall not be loaded based on deviations in the commercial conditions. If it is so declared, such loading of a financial bid shall be done as per the relevant provisions; 8. As per policies of the Government, from time to time, the Procuring Entity reserves its option to give purchase preferences to eligible categories of Bidders as indicated in the Tender Document. 9. Financial evaluation of Bids shall include and consider the following taxes/ duties, as per para 6.2: a) in the case of Services performed in India or incidental goods of foreign origin already located in India, GST & other similar duties, which shall be contractually payable, on the Services and incidental Goods, if a contract is awarded on the bidder; b) The offers shall be evaluated based on the GST rate quoted by each bidder, and the same shall be used for determining the inter-se ranking. The Procuring Entity shall not be responsible for any misclassification of HSN Number or incorrect GST rate if quoted by the bidder. Any increase in GST rate due to misclassification of HSN number shall have to be absorbed by the service provider; and c) If GST is quoted extra, but with the provision that it shall be charged as applicable at the time of delivery, the offer shall be evaluated for comparison purposes by loading the maximum existing rate of GST for the product/ HSN code. 10. Price Variation: If the bids have been invited on a variable price basis, they will be evaluated, compared, and ranked based on the position prevailing on the bid submission deadline and not based on any future date. If a Bidder submits a firm price quotation against the requirement of a variable price quotation, that bid shall be prima facie acceptable and considered further, taking the price variation asked for by the Bidder as nil. 11. Ambiguous Financial bid: If the financial bid is ambiguous and leads to two equally valid total price amounts, it shall be rejected as nonresponsive. 12. Instances of Multiple L1s: Rarely, there may be a tie at the lowest bid (L-l) position between two or more start-up/ non-start-up bidders. However, the method of selection of successful contractor in case of multiple L1 should be decided prior to issue of tender. It must be first determined whether it is a case of Cartel formation or anti-competitive practices, as per para 7.4.9 below, and if so, it shall be dealt with accordingly. If this is not a case of cartel formation, the following sequence of preference shall be adopted while considering the award of the contract: a) For Tender issued through NIC Portal/ manual basis: i) In case one of the L1 bidders is MSE owned by SC/ST or a Women Entrepreneur, then an order shall be placed on such bidder. ii) If one of the L1 bidders is MSE, then an order shall be placed on such bidders.

7.4.2. Least Cost Selection (LCS) Under the LCS procedures, the financial proposals will be ranked in terms of their total evaluated cost. The least cost proposal will be ranked as L-1 and the next higher and so on will be ranked as L-2, L-3 etc. The least cost proposal (L-1) will be considered for award of contract. The TC will put up a report on financial evaluation of the technically qualified service providers to the competent finance authority along with the recommendation that the least cost proposal (L-1) can be approved/ invited for negotiation and for final award of contract.

Chapter 7: Bid Evaluation, and Award of Contract iii) Otherwise, the order shall be placed on the L1 bidder having a higher turnover in the previous financial year. In case there is a tie at the lowest bid (L-1) position between only startup bidders and none of them has past turnover, the order will be placed on the startup that was registered earlier with the Department of Industrial Promotion and Policy. b) For Tenders having multiple L1s, issued through the GeM Portal: The tie-breaker methodology available on the GeM portal is to be followed.