Equality and Diversity...Making it happen in procurement!
The Open University is committed to an equality and diversity strategy covering age, disability, gender, race, religion and belief and sexual orientation. An important part of this commitment is to encourage and, where possible, require companies and other organisations that bid for University goods and services to practice equality and diversity in employment and service delivery.
The presentation below highlights the OU's procurement strategy, the ways that equality and diversity are embedded in the procurement cycle, and the challenges the OU is addressing to widen tender opportunities.
Procurement and equality presentation to Equality and Diversity Management Group, November 2008
The Open University manages its EU and non-EU tender processes through an e-Tendering system called In-Tend. The system is fully web-based and is used to tender for goods and services being sought by the University and gives easy and open access for suppliers to express interest in procurement opportunities. The system provides a fully auditable secure transfer of documents between us and the suppliers through each stage of the tender process, from evaluation of PQQs, through to short-listing of suppliers, evaluation of tender returns and finally award of contract.
In order to ensure that you do not miss out on any business opportunities with us, you must log onto the In-Tend website and register your company details, once registered you will be able to express interest in any current procurement opportunities.
