Quick guide for two-step procurement procedures - Step 2

(restricted procedures, competitive procedures with negotiation and design contests)

Getting started

The present Quick Guide applies to second step of the two-step procedures only. In this step, only the invited candidates, who passed exclusion and selection criteria in the first step, may submit a tender. The Quick Guides for the first step of the two-step procedures as well as the guides for other procurement procedures can be consulted on Funding & Tenders Portal eProcurement wiki.

As an economic operator, you can:

• Encode your response to a procedure launched by an EU institution or body

• Submit in a secure manner

• View or resume a saved draft

• Delete a draft submission

• Receive proof of submission (Submission Receipt)

• Withdraw a submission before the time limit for receipt of submissions

• Receive proof of withdrawal (Withdrawal Receipt)

Make sure you read the System Requirements.

You can find them on the front page of the eSubmission application and in the attachments section on the Parties page.

How do I get technical help?

If you need help, you can contact our support team, from 08:00 until 20:00 CET/CEST.

  ec-funding-tender-service-desk@ec.europa.eu

+32 (0) 229 71063

 The support team operates in English only.

How to prepare your tender in eSubmission 

If your request to participate has successfully passed the first step of the procedure you will receive a notification from TED eTendering inviting you to validate your access to the procurement documents and to submit a tender.

The notification will be sent to:

• the email address of the Contact Person indicated in the submission of the request to participate (Primary Coordinator Contact (PCoCo));
• the email address (if different) linked to the EU Login account used to submit the request to participate (Coordinator Contact (CoCo));
• the email address of any other Coordinator Contact(s) (CoCo) added using the ‘Manage roles’ action button on the submission of the request to participate.

The notifications can be accessed also through the TED eTendering My messages section.

To validate your access to the procurement documents the PCoCo/CoCo needs to click on the link in the notification. The link will direct you to the call for tenders’ page in TED eTendering where you will see the Submit a tender button. This button will bring you to the My Invitations section in the Funding & Tenders Portal.

To be able to submit a tender the PCoCo/CoCo needs first to acknowledge the receipt of the invitation to tender:

• Find the procedure in My Invitations in the Funding & Tenders Portal.
• In the Action menu of the procedure, click on Acknowledge Receipt in order to confirm that you have received the invitation. The status of the invitation will become Acknowledged.

After acknowledging the receipt of the invitation the PCoCo/CoCo will be automatically redirected to eSubmission, where you can start the submission of your tender by clicking on New submission. 

If you prefer to start your submission later:

• Log on to the Funding & Tenders Portal with the EU Login account of the person indicated as Contact Person (PCoCo) in the request to participate or, if different, the EU Login account of the person used to submit the request to participate (CoCo) or any other CoCo authorised through the “Manage roles” functionality of the Funding & Tenders Portal (for more information, see the section Manage Roles in Funding & Tenders Portal in this guide).
• Go to My Invitations and find the procedure.
• From the Action menu of the procedure, click on Start new submission. You will then be redirected to eSubmission.
  

In eSubmission click on New submission to start a new submission or Resume draft to resume a draft submission started earlier. You can also resume your draft from the Funding & Tenders Portal (for more information, see the section Manage submissions in Funding & Tenders Portal in this guide).

Navigating in eSubmission

When you start your submission you will see a progress line on top of the screen. This line shows all the steps you have to go through before submitting your tender. You can also see which step you are currently in.

At any time during the submission process you can see which documents have been uploaded by clicking on the Submission documents button on the left side of the screen.

Nothing is submitted to the contracting authority until you have clicked the Submit button at the end of the submission process.

Parties

In this step only the Contact Person section is editable.

The user starting the tender submission can indicate as Contact Person himself/herself (the name is already prefilled) or another person. If the latter does not have an EU Login account, a temporary EU Login account will be automatically created based on the Contact Person email address and the person will be invited by email to complete the EU Login registration. The invitation will be an automatic system message with no reference to the procedure.

The Contact Person receives the role  Primary Coordinator Contact (PCoCo) in the Funding & Tenders Portal and the user submitting the tender (if different from the Contact Person) - the role Coordinator Contact (CoCo). 

Click Next to move to the next step.

Tender data

In this section you need to enter the amount of your tender (only in case of the lowest cost or the lowest price award method  - make sure you use the same format as in the example on the screen) and/or confirm if your tender complies or not with the minimum requirements specified in the procurement documents.

If you confirm that your tender does not comply with the minimum requirements, you will be asked to provide an explanation in a dedicated text box. The confirmation of the compliance or non-compliance and the explanation in case of non-compliance will be reflected in the submission report.

After clicking on the Save button you can upload the financial tender and, if required by the contracting authority in the tender specifications, the technical tender. You can upload more than one file as technical/financial tender. 

Once you consider the tender data correct and the submission complete, click on Next. The button will be active only if all mandatory data and documents have been provided.

At this stage, your draft tender, including all your documents, is not submitted yet.

Submission report

The submission report is generated by the system and is part of the submission. The report lists all the documents included in the submission.

eSubmission automatically generates and adds the submission report to your submission. You can consult the report on the screen or download it for your own records (before submitting the tender). You don’t need to sign and upload the signed report in eSubmission.

After viewing the submission report, if you consider the submission complete and ready for submission, click on Next to continue.

The submission report is not a proof of submission. You have not submitted yet. Please proceed to the next step and click on Submit to finalise the submission.

Submit your tender

When you are ready to submit your tender, click on Submit. The system will display a confirmation message.

Click Yes if you want to confirm: you will no longer be able to modify this submission.

Please note that the system will not allow you to submit if the time limit for receipt of submissions has been reached.

An e-mail notification will be sent to the e-mail address linked to the EU login account of Primary Coordinator Contact (PCoCo) and all the Coordinator Contact(s) (CoCo) that are indicated for that tender. This e-mail notification contains a link to the Funding & Tenders Portal where the Submission Receipt can be found. 

The Submission Receipt constitutes proof of compliance with the time limit for receipt of submissions.

Manage roles in Funding & Tenders Portal

The Contact Person indicated in the tender in eSubmission receives the role Primary Coordinator Contact (PCoCo) for the submission of the tender in the Funding & Tenders Portal. There can be only one Primary Coordinator Contact per submission.

The user submitting the tender (if different from the Contact Person) receives the role Coordinator Contact (CoCo).

Additional Coordinator Contact(s) (CoCo) can be added or removed in the Funding & Tenders Portal after the contracting authority sends the invitations for step 2:

• Under the Action dropdown on the right of the invitation, click on the Manage Roles option.

• Click on Edit Roles button.

• To add a new CoCo click on Add Roles button.

To delete a CoCo, click on the delete icon next to their name.

• Add the details of the person to be added as a CoCo and click on the Ok button.

Manage submissions in Funding & Tenders Portal

The Funding & Tenders Portal is the single entry point (Single Electronic Data Interchange Area) for participants and experts in funding programs and tenders managed by the European Commission and other EU bodies.

From your private area of the Funding & Tenders Portal you can:

• View your invitations to tender
• Acknowledge receipt of an invitation
• Start new submission in response to an invitation
• View, edit or delete draft submissions (tenders)
• Withdraw submitted tenders
• Access your Submission/Withdrawal Receipts (proof of submission/withdrawal of a tender)
• Manage roles

To enter your private area of the Funding & Tenders Portal you need to authenticate yourself by using the Login button of the Funding & Tenders Portal at the top right end of the home page (enter your EU Login and password).

View Invitation(s)

Under the section Manage my area on the left the PCoCo/CoCo will find the invitations(s) for step 2 under My Invitation(s) section. A search field is also available on the right above the list of invitations.

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My Invitation(s) section My Invitation(s) section

My Invitation(s) section

For each invitation the PCoCo/CoCo can see the procedure reference number, the invitation status (received, acknowledged), the deadline, the lot (if applicable), the procedure title, the procedure type and the step.

The Action menu allows the PCoCo/CoCo to perform the following actions per invitation and submission status.

For invitations in Received status:

• Acknowledge Receipt: click here in order to confirm that you have received the invitation to submit a tender.
• Manage Roles:  you will be able to view and manage the access to your invitations (add/remove persons who will also be able to perform the herein described actions on your invitations).

For invitations in Acknowledged status:

• Start New Submission: click to submit a new tender.
• Manage Roles:  you will be able to view and manage the access to your invitations (add/remove persons who will also be able to perform the herein described actions on your invitations).

To view and manage the submissions against an invitation, click on the Submission(s) link.

The Action menu on the right of each submission (unless the submission has been deleted) allows the PCoCo/CoCo to perform different actions depending on the submission status.

For submissions in Draft status:

• Edit: eSubmission opens the screen you were in when you left the application. You can now edit your submission in eSubmission.
• View:  eSubmission  opens the screen you were in when you left the application the application. It is not possible to edit the submission as you are viewing it in read-only mode. 
• Delete:  the draft submission will be deleted from the Funding & Tenders Portal.

For submissions in Submitted status:

• View Receipt: the submission receipt is displayed.
• Withdraw  (available only before the deadline for submission):  provide the reason to withdraw the submission and confirm by clicking on the  Withdraw button. Once you have withdrawn a submission, you cannot view, edit or submit it again.

For submissions in Withdrawn status:

• View Withdrawal Receipt: the withdrawal receipt is displayed.

For submissions in Deleted status:

The  Action menu is not available  for the tenders with the status Deleted. Once a draft tender has been deleted, it cannot be retrieved by the tenderer. 

Subsequent round(s) for competitive procedures with negotiation

 This section applies only to competitive procedures with negotiation with more than one negotiation round in step two.

If the contracting authority decides to invite you to submit a revised tender through eSubmission, the PCoCo/CoCo will receive a notification from the Funding & Tenders Portal.

To submit a revised tender, the PCoCo/CoCo needs to acknowledge the receipt of the invitation. After acknowledging the receipt of the invitation the PCoCo/CoCo will be automatically redirected to eSubmission, where the submission of the revised tender can start by clicking on New submission. To learn how to submit a revised tender in the subsequent round(s), please refer to the Quick guide for negotiated procedures - Round 2 /subsequent round(s). 

Manage notifications in Funding & Tenders Portal

My notifications

The PCoCo/CoCo can access this page by clicking on the bell icon at the top right of the screen after having logged in to the Funding & Tenders Portal.

On this page the PCoCo/CoCo can find the following notifications:

• Submission Receipt (proof of submission of a tender)
• Withdrawal Receipt (proof of withdrawal of a tender)

In the Preferences tab under Manage all notifications (at the bottom of the notifications list) the PCoCo/CoCo can choose the frequency of Funding & Tenders Portal email notifications. Independently of your choice all the notifications are always available in the section My notifications.

My Formal Notification(s)

This section, available under Manage my area on the left, is currently not used for procurement procedures.