Thanks UK Gov for wasting so many resources

We just tendered for a c£10k piece of research work with a local authority. It took us 3 days to complete the paperwork.

They emailed to tell us that we had not been successful and that they had been “inundated” with tenders.

So I emailed them to ask how many had tendered. This is the reply I received:

“I was surprised to receive over 180 expressions of interest which were followed up by 49 costed submissions within the time frame and another 6 which we received too late to be included. I was surprised as this is quite a small piece of work really”.

What a scandalous waste of precious Small Business Resources! There has to be a better way. 

Giving us free access to tender opprotunities is not the answer.  All this will do is encourage yet more small business to waste yet more precious hours.