tendering

1. 1
   noununcountable

   The process of submitting a formal bid to win a contract or to supply goods and services.

   The council opened tendering for the road project last spring.

   Strict rules govern tendering in public-sector procurement.

   Similarbidding

   Note

   Usually a mass noun for the whole procedure, as in public-sector tendering, but it can also be counted. The plural tenderings refers to individual calls for bids, as when a buyer announces that tenderings for certain articles will be called for during the year. The verb behind it is the bidding sense of tender. The countable use names separate rounds of offers rather than the process as a whole.

2. 2
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of tender.

   The contractor is tendering for three separate projects at once.

   Tendering his apologies to the host, he slipped out before dessert.

   Note

   Several senses of the verb meet in this one form. Today it mostly carries the formal sense of offering, as in tendering an apology or a resignation, and the commercial sense of bidding, as in tendering for a contract. The archaic senses, making something delicate or regarding someone fondly, belong to older prose. The adjective tender, meaning sore to the touch, has no -ing form. When the bidding is treated as a thing in itself, the word becomes the noun for the bidding process.

Showing meanings only. Show all 2