How the winning Proposals will be converted into money? 2 August 2012
Our crash course, our glossary concerning the tender system finally arrived to – at first glance - probably the most interesting part for everybody, : How the winning Proposal will be converted into money? Our summary may provide a guide for all those, who would be pleased to participate in exploiting the opportunities offered by the New Széchenyi Plan, at least up to the extent of one Proposal.
Winning /Refusing Notice
The very much expected Winning Notice is the best news possibly for which one may have to wait in some cases even for months. The Authority through this notice informs us the amount of money it has set aside for developing our enterprise through the tender, that is, about the amount of money we won. Having the notice in the hand it is possible to start real work, to realise our dream, and finally development/implementation may be started with full power. According to a Greek proverb: „If you join the dance-circle, then you must dance!" – This is exactly the situation in this case as well; this is the point when real work starts.
Support Contract:
This is the official starting point of calling down the support provided by the tender, which interprets in detail, point by point the activities that have to be done, the schedule of progress, the commitments, with clarifying the steps of implementation and completion. This is a contract between the Proposer and the Authority prepared in the form of a written document. It contains the exact “data of the tender implementation of the tender. (e.g.: the data of the Proposer, the data of the Proposal, annexes, the steps of tracking the Proposal, the rules of disbursing the support, etc.) The contract is made official by the signature of the winning Proposer. It covers the real utilisation of the support won through the tender, how the project will be implemented and this is the place where the Proposer undertakes responsibility for implementing the contents of the Proposal.
Advance Money:
As it is well known, the EU tenders are ex post funded facilities. Therefore the option that assists the Proposers in the case of many tender invitations by allowing them to call down a part of the eligible costs incurred in the form of advance money is extremely important. The winning Proposer may submit a disbursal request for facilitating the starting of the project, provided the tender offers this option, or it has been included in the contract. This amount varies by tenders. There are cases when this option is not offered at all, but in the case of many tenders it is already quite usual that 25 % -50 % of the support may be called down as advance money.
When is it possible to start real work?
The projects may be started by the Proposer either after posting the Proposal immediately at its own risk or after receiving the Winning Notice. There are tender invitations that allow the Proposer to start at its own risk the implementation of its development concept and it may procure the desired asset, machine already the next day after submitting or posting the prepared Proposal, since the winning Proposer may win the amount of the support afterwards and the money may be refunded to Proposer.
The process of monitoring (tracking) follows step by step the progress of the implementation of the project that is written down in the Proposal of the Proposer (that is the progress of the implementation of the idea awaiting development, the concept submitted, the Proposal itself). The Authority this way checks whether the Proposer implements actually what it had written down in its Proposal and whether Proposer acts exactly based on what has been written down. It checks whether the project objectives set can be really achieved, and whether the implementation of the commitments does progress in order. Controlling is implemented in different ways. There are onsite inspections and there are documents that have to be submitted in writing for being checked, the purpose is the same in each case.
The Proposer has reporting obligations as well. Each month it has to submit certain materials to the Authority by the deadline set. With these documents - the same way as with the closing report and the sustaining reports - Proposer has to support the progress, the implementation of the project as regards content and time. The Proposer may submit the invoices as the attachments of these documents accompanied by a payment request, upon which the money will be transferred from a separated account to its own bank account.
The real magic comes at the point, when the Proposer may finally lean back in his armchair and may take it easy, because the project is completed, and it is already obvious that it was profitable! It is not an easy job, true enough, but after having done it, it really does matter, whether we achieved what we wanted, and the support was actually paid! This means that the project was advantageous for the enterprise and the EU funds were invested for a good purpose, especially because funds remained in our country, in Hungary.
Source: Piac&Profit; Papadopulu Aphrodite Expert, Brussels Centre, Hungarian Tender Consulting Centre