What a request for quotation is
A request for quotation (RFQ) asks several suppliers to price the same goods, so you can buy from the best. It lists what you want — each line with its quantity and unit — when you need the answers by, when you need the goods, and where they go. It is not an order to anybody: nothing is bought until an LPO is issued.
Procurement › Supplier quotes lists the requests — Open, Awarded, Closed or All — with how many suppliers have answered and whether the reply date has passed, newest first; search by the request number or what it is for, and Sort by date or number. New request starts one by hand; Ask suppliers for prices on an order starts one from the order's lines (see Orders and the customer's LPO). A line started from an order remembers which order it is for.
Ask the suppliers
- On the request, add the suppliers to ask. While nobody has been asked, the lines can still be changed.
- Press Ask suppliers and choose how: Email sends each supplier the request as a PDF with a link to answer it (they need an email address); Link gives you a link per supplier to send from your phone — Share on WhatsApp opens it ready to send; By hand records that you asked on the phone, and you type their prices in later.
- A link is shown only once, and only its fingerprint is kept. New link makes another (the old one stops working); Withdraw link stops it.
- Download request gives you the PDF for a supplier: the goods, quantities and units, with empty columns for their price, discount and lead time — never a price of yours or another supplier's.
Their answers
- Through their link, a supplier sees your company's name, the request and only their own prices, types a price per unit (before VAT), a discount, how much they can supply, their lead time and any alternative, and sends it. They can send it again while the request is open; the latest answer stands, and each one is on the request's history.
- Enter prices records what a supplier told you by phone, email or on their own quotation, line by line, with how long the prices are valid, the lead time and their payment and delivery terms. A line left without a price means they cannot supply it. Attach their quotation to the request if they sent one.
- Declined records that a supplier will not quote, with the reason if they gave one.
Compare and choose
The comparison puts every supplier's price for each line side by side: the net price per unit (after their discount, before VAT) and the line's total, with Lowest on the best. Only a price that is still valid, for the whole quantity and without an alternative counts as the lowest: an expired price, a part quantity or an alternative is shown and marked, never quietly ranked first. Below, each supplier's total, what buying each line from its lowest would cost, and the cheapest supplier for everything.
- Choose a supplier for each line — the lowest is chosen for you — or All from one supplier.
- If a choice is not the lowest valid price, or its prices have expired, say why. The reason is kept on the line and in the audit trail.
- Press Award. The request becomes Awarded (or Partly awarded), and the links stop working once every line is decided.
- Press Raise LPOs: one draft supplier LPO per chosen supplier, at the prices, units and terms they quoted, for the orders the lines were for. A line for an enquiry the customer has not confirmed yet waits — raise it once they confirm, here or from the order's Stock and buying step. Then approve and issue the LPOs as usual (see Supplier LPOs and goods received).
- To put more on one supplier's LPO — something for stock, or anything else bought from them — press Raise with more items… beside that supplier instead. The LPO dialog opens with their lines at the prices they quoted and the orders they are for; Add a line adds more. It is still this request's LPO.
Close ends a request nothing more is needed from; Cancel ends one you no longer want, with a reason — a draft nobody was asked about is simply thrown away.