Buyer FAQs

Q: I’m always hearing how E-commerce is going to streamline my purchasing processes. What does that mean?

A: Streamlining a process is simplifying that process. Depending on your purchasing guidelines, you most likely have to post RFQ’s or RFP’s through one method (legal news, newspapers, on-line etc), and analyze the information. There’s probably a second method for receiving the information and then another method for awarding the business. Our system will allow you to do all three, simply and easily, without having to get up from your desk.

Q: Law defines my purchasing guidelines. How can I use your system?

A: One of the central tenets of the system was to have every buying entity incorporate its unique procurement rules into the system. Its part of the initial set up we do for you. We give you compliance cues based on the purchasing limits and ranges and workflow methods that you set.

Q: How can your system save us money on our purchases?

A: There are four main ways our system saves our clients money on purchases. The first way is to reduce the administrative costs printing, copying, mailing, and handling of each bid request. The second way to save money is by reducing advertising costs in the long run. You need to follow your local, state or federal laws regarding advertising bids, however as the internet becomes more acceptable to your lawmakers, that may change the way you have to advertise or the consistency. The third is the actual communication between buyers and vendors once the bid has been published. The software allows for communication and evaluation processes that cuts a buyers time on any one bid by a minimum of 25%. A fourth is direct purchase price savings. By sending out your requests to a larger and more diverse vendor pool, increased competition drives down bid prices and results in lower direct product and services costs.

Q: I work for a small governmental agency in Arkansas. How would I benefit from using your system?

A: You will have access to a wider and more diverse supplier base that should drive your costs down through increased competition. You will also have online tools that will allow you to help expedite the way you now purchase.

Q: My Agency chooses suppliers on a service and quality basis only. How can your system possibly help?

A: The Economic Engine Private Marketplace will give you a larger and more diverse pool of suppliers than you can contact on your own. They will see your request and respond based upon your request requirements. A greater pool of suppliers allows you to pick the firm that best fits your needs.

Q: Who pays for the use of the system?
A: You as the buyer can choose to pay a transaction fee, or require the winning vendor to pay the fee. There is a maximum of one percent transaction fee that will be charged 90 days after any award made on the system by your Agency. For companies that utilize the marketplace for at least 75% of their purchasing this fee narrows down to less than 0.3%. The system is designed to allow all agencies and their vendors to save money whether it is through speed of bid information, marketing dollars, or evaluation time on both sides. It will be easy for you to document the time savings and potential hard dollar savings by using the system properly. If you don’t realize a savings in time and money during your first few published bids, then you have the choice to not use the system in the future, but still taking advantage of the supplier information listed within.

Q: We are a large Agency that has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in the implementation of an ERP software, and after much time and effort we have the system functioning the way we need it to. We put all of our requests into this software which then tracks PO’s and payments. Can the system be set up so our buyers don’t do double the work when they use the DET Marketplace?

A: Yes. Every Agency can immediately access the browser based system and start taking advantage of the large supplier base competitively bidding on their procurement needs, and lowering their costs. Ultimately though, to totally eliminate the specter of buyers doing double work, we can totally integrate your current software into the Economic Engine Marketplace. How it works is like this. You utilize the Economic Engine Marketplace and make the decision that you wish to use it for the majority of your purchasing needs. Make a request in email form to Customer Support for an evaluation to be done for integrating to your back end system. Once the evaluation is done, it is submitted to Economic Engine for approval, based on the cost of the integration and the benefit to both the Agency and Economic Engine.