The date in the bidding timetable most businesses ignore.
It's the deadline for clarification questions. A clarification question is a formal question you put to the buyer during a live tender, and the answer is shared with every bidder.
The deadline is usually well before the submission date. Miss it and the door closes. The red flag you spotted on day nine stays in your bid, along with the doubt about whether you should be bidding at all.
Read the timetable on day one, diarise that date, and send your questions early, not at the last minute. A buyer with time to think gives a better answer.
A few basics the professional bid writers follow:
- Don't ask anything the tender documents already answer. It tells the buyer you haven't read them.
- Read the responses already published before you submit a new question. Duplicates irritate your fellow bidders, who have to wade through the same answer again, just as much as they irritate the buyer.
- Be specific. Quote the paragraph or criterion you're asking about.
Be aware that some buyers don't answer as questions arrive. They collect them all, then publish the answers together after the deadline. That can leave you very little time to act on what you learn. If that will affect your ability to bid, say so in the question and explain the impact.
The first question in many clarification rounds is "can we have an extension?" Usually, but not always, the answer is no. Where it does work is when the buyer has made significant changes during the process. Asking for more time to consider new information is legitimate, so make the link explicit: what changed, and why it needs more time.
And the golden rule: read every clarification response as soon as it's published, and tell your writers immediately if it changes the response. There is nothing worse than doing all the work and then finding a change.
Chapter 9 of my book covers how to use clarification questions strategically, and Chapter 10 covers handling them during the writing.