How to read the International Tender Documents?

In 1984, The factory of the Turkish-American joint venture company, which built military fighter jets in Ankara,  opened a national tender to purchase a high-efficiency water tube steam boiler that could burn Beypazarı Çayırhan coal. The scope consisted of three 20 tons / hour and one 10 tons / hour capacity water-tube steam boilers that will produce at 20 bar 200c superheared steam.

The tender documents would be prepared in English, the invitation would be in English, the bids would be prepared in English, most importantly, all standards to be used would be in accordance with American ASTM ASME standards.

We bought the tender documents, when we put the tender documents on top of each other, it was almost one meter, there was a very detailed standard document for everything that came to mind. First, we duplicated the document containing technical information, we designed the water tube steam boilers in accordance with American standards, we estimated pricing, the steam boilers would be in a closed steel construction building, we made the steel building design, the introduction in English was already ready, we presented  our price dependent Turkish lira with escalation. .

The offers given other than us were not in our setting, the English spelling was not correct, the designs did not give confidence, American Asme. They were not compatible with ASTM standards. The buyer did not force us to discount on the price. We finally got the job, but none of us had read the other standards, requirements, other than technical documentation.

I went to the tender award meeting in two big hand bags with all the tender documents. We thought they were going to push us for the price deduction  for the last time. The American general manager came to the meeting room and congratulated us on the tender. Then the staff in charge brought long wine glasses with white sparkling wine in a tray. Cheers. It was enough for them that the price we gave was the lowest among competing prices. We were glad that the price we gave was accepted exactly.

The team of the buyer firm that controlled us was full of Turkish-American personnel, meetings, correspondence were always done in English. The buyer engineer staff followed us in accordance with the American standards in their hands during the construction process, English forms were filled, welding qualification tests in accordance with American standards were performed, material acceptance tests were carried out.

Finally, acceptance tests were again conducted in accordance with American standards. The job was completed, we didn't make much money at the end of the job, but we gained great experience. The ability to do similar international jobs has been in the memory of our company staff. It was a great benefit in our subsequent work abroad.

Ten years later, the same company opened a tender for a 70 tons / hour at 20 bar 200c superheated steam boiler with equivalent steam output capacity. This time, natural gas and fuel oil firing would be purchased and a high efficiency package steam boiler with watertube. Again, the American standards, which reached a height of one meter, came before us in the annex of the tender document. The price would be given this time in American dollars, and American inflation indexes based on years would be used in payments.

This time, I read all the documents page by page, took notes, took the monetary cost of each request into the final account costs. There were cost  that we surely skipped and could not add price, this time we tried to reduce it more. The same American general manager came to the meeting room, congratulated us, again, sparkling cold white wine was served, and we celebrated with a sip.

Today, purchasers no longer give paper printed documents in similar tenders. Instead, they sell cd. You apply to get the tender documents, you make a certain prepayment, they send you a cd with a single page attachment, you open it with a pc, it comes out with pages full of pdf specs, pages of word forms to fill, you read for days, take notes, price everything. That is required.

Another common application emerged during the Covid-19 pandemic process. Now everything is on-line. Education online, shopping online, meetings online, office work turns online at home, then auctions online.

You can search on the internet, there are many tender invitations online, if you are looking for tenders for the construction of thermal power plants, it is possible to reach the English calls and documents of the tenders opened in Iraq, Georgia, Pakistan and most African countries. Organisations such as the World Bank and the United Nations development organisation provide trainings for recalling international tender documents to public institution employees of developing countries. These tenders have now become standard documents.

However, due to the tightness in our domestic financial system, there is a general difficulty in obtaining the letter of guarantee required to participate in the tender. Our large contracting companies operating abroad can overcome the trouble here by using the commercial banks there. Our big companies can work abroad easily by using young local engineers,

It is now possible to access tender invitations over the Internet, our home office employees can work from home 24/7, read the tender documents, evaluate them, make necessary in-house meetings over the zoom, fill in the documents, and deliver them to the required places. Now, opportunities for long-distance-overseas-intercontinental travel are limited, but in the new world of covid-19, other opportunities open up other opportunities in new times, the world will be completely different after the covid-19 pandemic.

Prinkipo, November 5, 2020