What are the benefits of an e-procurement solution?
What are the benefits of using an e-procurement solution for the buyer? How does the government entity as a whole benefit from this purchasing decision?
Over 1,200 local government entities utilize a BidNet Purchasing Group as their main bid distribution and vendor management tool. Since 1999, BidNet has learned about the needs of its participating purchasing users and implemented those requirements for a seamless purchasing system. BidNet Direct helps cut costs, improves efficiency, and makes increased vendor outreach achievable.
Cutting costs & improving efficiency
Taking the purchasing process online saves time and money. From days of standing by a fax machine or mailing out RFPs, the procurement process has come a long way! In just a few minutes, you can now not only upload and post a solicitation, but it is made available to all vendors at the same time with just one click! In addition, BidNet Direct’s online vendor registration and Vendor Support team take the majority of phone calls and enquiries from vendors, saving your team time to focus on the next solicitation and strategic purchasing initiatives. Our online Q&A allows vendors to submit questions directly online; when questions are answered, you can select to automatically send all public Q&A’s out as an addendum. With these features, BidNet Direct saves government entities time and money while improving efficiency.
Increasing vendor outreach
BidNet Direct is already home to tens of thousands of registered vendors through our regional purchasing groups. By utilizing a local, pre-established vendor pool, you are increasing your vendor outreach with each new solicitation posted. In addition to the purchasing group local vendor database, our government entity partners also have access to all registered vendors on the system throughout the country. This gives you the option to notify additional vendors and have vendors nationwide access your solicitations. Your current vendors (if already not registered on the system) can easily register, at no cost, to view your solicitations and download any documents and addendum. Vendors also have the option to get notified of all solicitations from throughout the state, a huge benefit to their business. Increase your vendor outreach and competition with BidNet’s existing vendor database.
Transparency in purchasing
We understand that transparency is an important part of public purchasing. Whether it is the elected officials or a protesting vendor or another department within the organization, someone normally has questions about the sourcing process. Bidnet Direct’s reporting makes those answers easy to deliver with extensive tracking and reporting features. The system tracks the purchasing process from beginning to end, with configurable reporting tools able to extract any number of data points for true transparency. From seeing how many vendors will be notified, to viewing what time a specific vendor downloaded an addendum, all information is tracked and available for export.
An additional level of security and transparency is provided by the configurable Approval Workflow, which allows you to easily define who has the right to access, edit, or publish solicitations based on pricing threshold, solicitation type or a variety of criteria. All reporting and tracking information can be viewed online, downloaded and printed, giving you access to the reports needed, when needed.
Improving the purchasing process with BidNet Direct
With BidNet Direct, buyers benefit from the ease of use of the sourcing tools online. Just some of the benefits discussed above include:
• Creating RFPs and bids and sending them directly to all registered vendors through automatic notifications
• Distributing documents, specifications, and addenda to vendors instantly
• Publishing amendments instantly
• Viewing & classifying vendors by NIGP
• Awarding bids to qualified vendors
• Receiving bids electronically via EBS
• Answering vendor questions online with Q&A
• Quoting and managing line items
• Ensuring current approval workflows remain with our configurable Approval Workflows
• Tracking every step of the purchasing process including vendor and buyer actions
It has never been easier to save time, cut costs and increase vendor outreach and transparency than with current e-procurement technology. Our participating counties, municipalities, school districts and special districts have simplified the purchasing process, allowing the focus to be on important and strategic procurement initiatives.
Find out how BidNet Direct can help your government organization today! 
