e-REOI Expression of Interest Preparation Guideline

01When to Use e-REOI

Use e-REOI when you need a consulting firm and want to find out, openly and fairly, which firms are capable before you ask any of them for a full proposal. Firms send an Expression of Interest (EOI) describing who they are, how they manage quality and what similar work they have done. You evaluate the EOIs and invite only the best-qualified firms, the short list, to the Request for Proposal (RFP).

Nature

Service

Who responds

Consulting firms, alone or as a joint venture

Value

Any; the RFP that follows depends on value

Competition

National

Price asked?

No. Price comes only in the RFP

Result

A short list for the RFP

1. Write the short TOR and the short-listing criteria; get the REOI approved.
2. Publish the REOI on e-GP (and advertise as PPR 2025 requires).
3. Answer questions; firms submit EOIs on e-GP before the closing date.
4. The evaluation committee checks eligibility, rates each EOI and recommends a short list.
5. The short list is approved and the firms are notified.
6. Issue the RFP to the short-listed firms only.

This STD is titled "For Selection of Consulting Firm". To hire an individual consultant, use e-PS3 (lump sum) or e-PS4 (time based) and follow the PPR 2025 rules for individual selection.

02What the Document Contains

The e-SREOI is short. You supply Section 1; the rest are forms the firm completes on e-GP.

03Writing the Short TOR

The STD gives Section 1 only a note: the consultant will respond exactly against the TOR. Everything a firm writes, and everything your committee judges, is measured against it, so a vague TOR produces vague EOIs. Keep it to two or three pages and cover:

• Background: the project, the problem, and who the Client is.
• Objectives: what the assignment must achieve, in one or two sentences.
• Scope: the main tasks and the location(s) of work.
• Outputs: the reports or products expected, with indicative timing.
• Duration and inputs: indicative period and, if you know it, key staff-months.
• Expertise: the disciplines and key positions the team will need.
• What makes an assignment "similar": the type, scale and setting of work that will count as similar experience. Firms need this to choose between tables 2.1 and 2.2.

Example: defining "similar" "A similar assignment is a feasibility study or detailed design of a rural road or bridge project, completed in the last 10 years, with a contract value of at least Tk. 50 lakh." Without this, firms will list everything as similar and your committee will argue over each row.

Whoever drafts the TOR, inside or outside your office, must not later bid. If a firm helped write it, that firm and its experts are excluded from this short list.

04EOI Submission Form

Part A asks each firm, or the JV as a whole, for:

1. Association type: single party or joint venture, listing the JV parties.
2. Firm details: name; date of incorporation or registration of each firm; board of directors, if any; years in business (calculated by e-GP from the registration date); number of permanent key staff; total office space in square feet; certifications and awards such as ISO or CMMI.
3. Brochures and related documents: uploaded files. The draft leaves open whether this upload is mandatory.
4. Eligibility declaration, e-signed (section 05).

Because the draft is undecided on brochures, say plainly in the REOI notice whether they are required. Do not reject an EOI for missing a document you did not clearly ask for.

05Eligibility Declaration

Each firm declares, with its e-signature, that:

• It has read the REOI, including the TOR.
• It was not engaged, as an entity, association or JV, to prepare this TOR.
• None of its full-time, part-time or contracted experts was engaged to prepare it.

It also accepts that if any of its experts prepares a TOR for a follow-on assignment as part of this work, the firm and those experts are disqualified from short-listing and participation in that follow-on assignment.

Check the declaration against your own records of who worked on the TOR, feasibility work or earlier phases. A false declaration is grounds to exclude the firm and may amount to a fraudulent practice under PPR 2025.

06Management Competence

Firms answer six questions, typed or as an uploaded document. Here is what a good answer shows:

Tell firms in the REOI notice which items matter for this assignment. A desk study does not need survey equipment or a laboratory, so do not award points for them.

07Technical Competence and Experience

Firms upload a narrative describing their experience and professional qualifications relevant to the TOR, then list assignments in two tables. Every row has its own upload for supporting documents.

Each row records:

• Assignment name, contract value (any currency), location and duration in months.
• Client name, mobile and email, so you can verify.
• Number of professional key staff the firm provided and total key staff-months.
• Start and completion dates (DD/MM/YYYY).
• JV role (not applicable, lead or secondary) and staff-months provided by JV partners.
• A narrative description of the assignment and of the services the firm's own staff actually provided.

Count only what the firm itself did. In a JV, the firm's share is shown by its role and the staff-months it, not its partners, supplied. Spot-check a few client contacts before finalizing the short list.

08Financial Statements and TOR Response

• Form 3, audited financial statement (mandatory): one row per financial year with the amount in Taka (or the Taka equivalent) and in words. The form does not say how many years or which figure, so state both in the REOI, for example "average annual turnover over the last 3 audited years".
• Conversion: foreign amounts are converted at the Bangladesh Bank rate on the date the REOI is published.
• Form 4, response on TOR (optional): the firm's comments against TOR reference numbers. Use them to improve the TOR before the RFP; do not penalize firms that leave it blank.

Example: currency conversion The REOI is published on 1 November. If the Bangladesh Bank rate that day is Tk. 122 per US$, a firm with US$ 500,000 turnover enters Tk. 6.1 crore, whatever rate applied when the accounts were audited.

09Setting Short-Listing Criteria

The e-SREOI collects information but contains no scoring table, minimum thresholds or short-list size. Decide them before you publish and state them in the REOI notice, so firms know how they will be judged and your committee cannot be accused of moving the goalposts.

• Weight similar experience most. It is the best predictor of a good proposal and the easiest to verify.
• Keep thresholds proportionate. A turnover or years-in-business minimum far above the assignment's size shuts out capable smaller firms.
• Do not score key experts' CVs here. Individual experts are evaluated in the RFP; the EOI is about the firm.
• Say how JVs are assessed, for example combined experience with the lead partner meeting a set share.
• State the short-list size required by PPR 2025 and how ties are broken.

10Evaluating EOIs

1. After closing, the committee opens the EOIs on e-GP and records who responded.
2. Check eligibility: declaration signed, no TOR conflict, firm not debarred, mandatory Form 3 present.
3. Rate each eligible EOI against the published criteria only. Each member scores separately; use the average.
4. Verify the claims that decide the ranking: completion certificates or contracts for similar assignments, and a call or email to a sample of clients.
5. Rank the firms and prepare the evaluation report with the recommended short list, reasons for each exclusion and the scores.
6. Obtain approval at the level PPR 2025 sets and notify all respondents of the result.

You may ask a firm to clarify its EOI, but not to add new assignments or change its answers. If too few qualified firms respond, follow the PPR 2025 rules: re-advertise, widen the TOR's definition of similar, or proceed with fewer firms where the rules allow it.

11After the Short List

Issue the RFP that matches the estimated cost and how you will pay:

• Only short-listed firms receive the Letter of Invitation. A short-listed firm cannot partner with another short-listed firm.
• Firms that expressed interest but were not short-listed may join a short-listed firm only with your approval.
• Update the TOR with what you learned from the Form 4 comments before issuing the RFP.

12Points to Correct in the Draft

The October 2025 e-SREOI still has open drafting notes and gaps. Settle them in your REOI or ask BPPA:

• Item A.3 reads "Brochures and related documents (Mandatory document upload): Will discuss regarding mandatory or not?" It is an unresolved internal note. State in the REOI whether the upload is mandatory.
• There are no evaluation criteria, minimum thresholds or short-list size. Publish your own (section 09).
• Section 1 has no TOR outline, only "Consultant will response exactly based on TOR". Use the structure in section 03.
• Form 3 does not say how many financial years or which figure (turnover, net worth) is wanted. Specify both.
• The table of contents lists only parts A, B-1 and B-2; Forms 3 and 4 are missing from it.
• The column numbers in tables 2.1 and 2.2 run 1, 2, 9, 3, 8, 6, 7, 12, 13, 10, 11, 4, 5, apparently the e-GP field order rather than the printed order.
• Table 2.2 has a column for the names of JV consultants; table 2.1 does not. Ask firms to name JV partners in the 2.1 narrative.
• Table 2.1 gives location as a country drop-down, table 2.2 as "within country / outside country"; accept either.
• Typos: "join venture" for joint venture; "Consultant will response".

13Preparation Checklist

• A consulting firm (not an individual) is needed; the assignment is in the procurement plan.
• Short TOR written, including a clear definition of "similar assignment".
• No firm or expert involved in the TOR will be allowed to apply.
• Short-listing criteria, points, minimum score, short-list size and JV treatment decided and written into the REOI notice.
• Financial statement requirement specified: number of years and figure.
• Brochure upload marked mandatory or optional.
• Management competence items relevant to the assignment identified.
• REOI approved, published on e-GP and advertised as PPR 2025 requires, with enough time to respond.
• Evaluation committee formed; members have signed conflict-of-interest declarations.
• RFP type (e-PS5 to e-PS8) chosen for the next stage.

14Common Questions