An award management software RFP tends to be built from a feature list, and a feature list is the one thing every serious vendor can satisfy. Online submission, file uploads, judge logins, scoring, email notifications, a results dashboard — everybody has these. Ask about them and every response comes back a uniform yes, which tells you nothing and leaves you choosing on price.
The questions worth asking are the ones where answers actually diverge. Below are eight, drawn from writing and responding to tenders in this category, each paired with the answer pattern that should give you pause. Put them in your own document verbatim if they are useful.
On this page
- Governance and fairness (Q1–Q2)
- Data, privacy and jurisdiction (Q3–Q4)
- Scale and the deadline peak (Q5–Q6)
- Exit and portability (Q7–Q8)
- How to weight an award management software RFP
Governance and fairness
This is where products differ most and where RFPs ask least. Almost every platform can collect a score. Far fewer can tell you afterwards how a decision was reached.
How does the system handle a declared conflict of interest between a judge and an entrant?
What a strong answer contains
Declaration prompted against the actual assigned entry list, re-prompted on reassignment, resolution decided by an administrator rather than the declaring judge, and the whole exchange retained in the record.
What should worry you
“Judges can add a note.” A free-text field is not conflict management. It puts the burden on individual conscience and leaves nothing you can produce later.
If an entrant challenges a result eighteen months from now, what can we produce?
What a strong answer contains
A specific list: assignments and why, declarations and resolutions, per-criterion scores by judge, every revision with its reason and author, and the normalisation applied. Ideally exportable as a single defensible bundle.
What should worry you
A demonstration of the results dashboard. The dashboard shows the outcome; a challenge is about the working. If the answer drifts to reporting, the audit layer probably is the reporting.
Both questions come from the same underlying principle covered in our guide to the award judging process: fairness cannot be demonstrated retrospectively, only designed in. The Committee on Publication Ethics guidance for peer reviewers is a useful external benchmark to cite in the RFP itself, since it gives you named relationship types and a time window rather than an appeal to judgement.
Data, privacy and jurisdiction
For programmes operating in Hong Kong and the wider region, this section is usually where an otherwise strong international vendor becomes difficult to approve.
Where is applicant data stored, and who are the subprocessors?
What a strong answer contains
Named hosting regions, a current subprocessor list, and a commitment to notify before it changes. If you need in-region residency, the answer states whether that is available and at what cost.
What should worry you
A cloud provider’s name offered as the whole answer. The provider is not the subprocessor list, and “enterprise-grade security” is not a residency commitment.
How does the platform support compliance with the Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance specifically?
What a strong answer contains
Engagement with the actual obligations — purpose limitation on collected data, retention and erasure controls you can configure, and a workable route for data access and correction requests.
What should worry you
“We are GDPR compliant, so you are covered.” Overlapping, not identical. A vendor that has never read the PCPD guidance will say this with total confidence.
Scale and the deadline peak
Award programmes have an unusual load profile. Traffic is negligible for weeks, then a substantial share of all entries arrives in the final forty-eight hours, many carrying large attachments. Average capacity figures are close to meaningless here.
What happens to a half-completed submission when the deadline passes mid-upload?
What a strong answer contains
Defined behaviour: drafts autosaved, a stated rule for in-flight uploads, an administrator-controlled grace mechanism, and a log of who was affected so you can adjudicate consistently.
What should worry you
Surprise at the question. This scenario happens in nearly every cycle and produces the angriest emails a programme manager receives.
Describe your largest deadline-day peak: entries, concurrent users, total upload volume.
What a strong answer contains
Concrete figures from a real programme, with the shape of the curve, and honesty about anything that degraded and what changed afterwards.
What should worry you
Total customer counts or annual entry volumes offered instead. Aggregate scale says nothing about the single hour that actually tests the platform.
Exit and portability
Ask these before signing, because the answers are unobtainable afterwards. A vendor’s willingness to answer plainly is itself a strong signal.
On termination, what exactly do we receive, in what format, and how long do you retain a copy?
What a strong answer contains
Structured data in an open format, original uploaded files, scores and audit history included rather than just entries, a stated delivery window, and a defined deletion date.
What should worry you
“A CSV export is available.” A CSV of entries without the scoring and audit history means your judging record does not survive the contract.
What does year three cost, on our projected volume?
What a strong answer contains
A three-year figure with the growth assumptions stated and every per-unit driver named — entries, judges, administrators, storage, support tier.
What should worry you
A year-one price and a friendly assurance about renewals. If the drivers are not written down, the escalation is not constrained.
How to weight an award management software RFP
Weighting decides the outcome more than the questions do. A scorecard that puts most of its weight on functionality will select the vendor with the longest feature list, which is rarely the vendor you want. A starting point we would defend:
| Criterion | Weight | |
|---|---|---|
| Governance, fairness and audit | 25% | |
| Security, privacy and jurisdiction | 20% | |
| Functional fit | 20% | |
| Three-year total cost | 15% | |
| Peak-load evidence | 10% | |
| Support model and language coverage | 10% |
Publish the weighting with the RFP. Deciding weights after responses arrive — even with entirely honest intentions — makes the award difficult to defend, which is the same failure mode these questions are designed to prevent in your own judging.
One caveat worth stating plainly: we build award management software, so we are not a neutral party here. These questions are the ones we think separate serious products from demonstrations, and we would rather be measured against them than against a feature checklist. Test them on us alongside everyone else.
If you are earlier in the process and still deciding whether to buy at all, our audit of award management software in Hong Kong covers why so many regional programmes never reach the RFP stage. For the judging mechanics behind Q1 and Q2, see judging features and our comparison against Award Force.
Putting an award management software RFP together? Book a live demo and put these eight questions to us directly, or review pricing first.
