Supplier Platform Terms of Use

1. Who these terms are between

These terms govern supplier access to the eSourcing DATA procurement platform, including its supplier portal (the Platform). The platform-access contract is between eSourcing Data Ltd, company number 16391108, whose registered office is 63 Mill Lane, London, United Kingdom, NW6 1NB (we, us), and the business, organisation or sole trader for which the account is created (you).

Our contact email is info@esourcingdata.com. GBS Procure administers procurements as a managed-service provider for buyers. Your platform-access contract under these terms is with eSourcing Data Ltd; the relevant procurement identifies the buyer responsible for any resulting supply contract.

The named individual registering confirms that they have authority to accept these terms for you and to carry out the activities they undertake. The Platform is offered for business and professional procurement use, not personal consumer purchases. Each user must be appropriately authorised by their organisation.

These terms take effect for you when you expressly accept this version and we create your supplier account. They are not imposed retrospectively on an existing account merely because its user visits the Platform. You can retain a copy of the version presented when you register.

Important: this is free business-use access. Section 13 excludes liability to suppliers to the fullest extent permitted by law, including specified business and bidding losses. Read it before accepting. These terms do not exclude liability which cannot lawfully be excluded.

2. Platform access and procurement contracts

We provide the electronic facilities for finding opportunities, accessing procurement documents, communicating with buyers and submitting responses. Each buyer is responsible for its procurement, instructions, decisions and any resulting contract. GBS Procure may administer an opportunity on a buyer's behalf within the authority given to it.

Registering, expressing interest, submitting a response or receiving an automated acknowledgement does not itself award you a contract or guarantee qualification, invitation, evaluation success or future work. Any resulting supply contract is governed by the relevant procurement documents and agreement with the buyer. These platform terms do not replace them or alter the buyer's statutory obligations.

These are supplier-facing terms of use only. They do not replace, amend, incorporate or override any agreement between eSourcing Data Ltd and GBS Procure, any buyer or another platform client, including their commercial terms, service levels, liability allocation or data-processing agreement. You do not acquire rights under those separate agreements by accepting these terms. Any independently existing rights under an agreement to which you are actually a party remain unaffected.

Procurement-specific instructions govern the conduct of the relevant opportunity. If a notice, document or platform entry appears inconsistent, promptly ask the buyer to clarify; do not assume these terms resolve an inconsistent deadline or amend an advertised requirement. Nothing here removes statutory procurement rights or remedies.

3. Charges

Supplier registration, access to available opportunities and documents, and submission of bids through the Platform are free. You remain responsible for your own connectivity, equipment and bid-preparation costs.

Optional services, including any separately offered bid-writing product, require their own express agreement and any disclosed charges. Buying them is not a condition of participating through the Platform and does not confer favourable treatment in a procurement. Registration does not enrol you in a paid subscription.

4. Accounts and security

Provide accurate, current information about your organisation and your authority to act for it. Keep contact details up to date and promptly correct material errors. Do not impersonate another organisation or claim an invitation or supplier record without authority. Registration or an automated company-data check is not certification of eligibility or capability.

Use a separate named account for each authorised user. Keep credentials and verification links confidential, use appropriate security measures and promptly report suspected compromise. You are responsible for managing your authorised users and notifying us when access should be removed. Responsibility for misuse will depend on the circumstances; these terms do not make you responsible for failures caused by our own breach of duty.

5. Submissions and deadlines

Read the buyer's instructions and allow sufficient time to complete, upload and submit your response. The Platform displays deadline dates and times in UK time, identifying BST or GMT. Saving a draft, uploading a document or beginning a submission is not the same as completing submission.

Check that the Platform records the intended response as submitted and retain the available acknowledgement and your own copy. An acknowledgement confirms receipt, not compliance, completeness, qualification or acceptance by the buyer. Report missing confirmation or apparent errors promptly.

Where amendment reopens a submitted bid as a draft, complete and resubmit it before the deadline; do not assume the former submitted status remains in place. Withdrawal and amendment are available only where the Platform and procurement process permit them.

The Platform may refuse actions after the recorded cutoff. Only the buyer can decide, in accordance with applicable law and the procurement rules, whether an extension or alternative submission arrangement is appropriate. A technical incident, support request or email does not automatically extend a deadline or constitute a valid submission. This does not excuse our own legal obligations or prevent you from raising an incident or challenge.

6. Communications, clarifications and market engagement

Check the Platform regularly for relevant changes, messages and clarification answers. Email notifications supplement the Platform and may be delayed or filtered. Follow the buyer's stated communication arrangements.

New clarification questions may become visible immediately to other suppliers entitled to view the opportunity. Do not include personal contact details, your identity, pricing, commercially sensitive information or confidential bid content in a shared clarification. Answers may be circulated to participating suppliers. Use a clearly private channel, where available, for confidential exchanges, or ask the buyer how to communicate securely. Existing private conversations retain their applicable visibility controls.

Buyers may redact identifying or inappropriate wording from the shared view while retaining originals for audit. Redaction cannot recall copies or notifications already received by others; do not rely on it to make a confidential disclosure safe.

Market-engagement participation is not a tender submission or promise of a later procurement. Its feedback may inform procurement planning. The buyer's engagement instructions explain what is requested and how it intends to use responses.

7. Acceptable use

Use the Platform lawfully and only within your authorised access. Do not submit material you have no right to disclose; misrepresent facts or authority; collude, bribe or manipulate a procurement; upload malicious code; harass others; attempt to obtain other suppliers' confidential information; defeat access controls; or disrupt service.

Do not conduct unauthorised security testing, abusive automated collection or bulk unsolicited messaging. Report suspected vulnerabilities privately to our support contact without accessing, altering or copying other users' information beyond what is necessary to describe the issue lawfully.

You remain responsible for checking the accuracy, originality, confidentiality and procurement compliance of material prepared using AI or other third-party tools. Their use does not transfer that responsibility or guarantee a compliant bid.

8. Content and intellectual property

You and your licensors retain ownership of the material you provide. You grant us the limited rights necessary to host, copy, transmit, back up and otherwise process it to operate the Platform, administer the relevant procurement, maintain its records and meet legal obligations. Authorised buyers, their appointed advisers and service providers may access it for those purposes under the applicable arrangements. This is not a general licence to sell your bid or exploit it for unrelated purposes.

The Platform's software, branding and other platform materials belong to their respective owners or licensors. Your permission to use the service does not transfer those rights. Use procurement documents only as permitted by their owners and the relevant procurement instructions, including necessary sharing with authorised advisers or bid partners subject to appropriate confidentiality obligations.

9. Confidentiality and lawful disclosure

We will handle non-public information using appropriate access controls and confidentiality arrangements. Access may be required by the relevant buyer, its authorised evaluation or support personnel, its managed-service provider and our authorised staff or processors. Do not treat all channels as confidential: published documents and shared clarifications have different visibility from bids and private messages.

The access and opening arrangements for a response depend on the relevant procurement procedure and permissions. Do not assume that every type of communication, market-engagement response or uploaded document is a sealed tender; follow the buyer's instructions and the channel's stated visibility.

A buyer or platform operator may have to disclose information under applicable procurement transparency requirements, freedom-of-information or environmental-information law where applicable, a court order or another legal duty. Identify genuinely confidential material and explain the reason and expected duration of sensitivity. A confidentiality marking does not itself override a legal disclosure duty. Where lawful and practicable, the responsible organisation should consider relevant representations before disclosure.

10. Personal information

Our Supplier Platform Privacy Notice, provided alongside these terms at registration, explains the organisations responsible for personal information, purposes and lawful bases, recipients, international transfers, retention, rights and complaint arrangements. Buyers' own privacy information may also apply to procurement processing. The allocation of controller and processor responsibilities depends on the activity and the actual arrangements; it is not defined solely by these terms.

Only provide personal information you are entitled to share and which is necessary for the relevant purpose. Give affected colleagues and other individuals appropriate privacy information. Do not include unnecessary sensitive personal information in bids or shared questions. Follow any secure submission instructions for information a buyer legitimately requires.

Accepting these contractual terms is not consent to marketing or blanket consent to all processing of personal information. Any consent that is needed for a separate purpose must be obtained and managed separately. Statutory data-protection rights are unaffected.

11. Availability, support and accessibility

The free supplier service is provided on an "as available" basis. To the fullest extent permitted by law, we exclude implied warranties, conditions and representations concerning availability, accuracy, completeness, satisfactory quality or fitness for a particular purpose. We do not guarantee uninterrupted or error-free access, delivery of every notification, compatibility with every device, or that use of the Platform will produce a compliant or successful bid. This does not exclude a duty which the law does not permit us to exclude.

Maintenance, changes, third-party failures and security incidents may affect availability. Where practicable, we will give notice of planned material interruption. Features may be changed or withdrawn, subject to our legal obligations; this does not amend the terms of any procurement or our separate client agreements.

Contact info@esourcingdata.com for technical assistance or accessibility barriers; contact the buyer about procurement content, extensions and decisions. We will consider reasonable adjustments and coordinate with the buyer where appropriate. No guaranteed response time or uptime commitment is created unless expressly agreed. Report incidents promptly with the opportunity reference, time and relevant error details, without sending passwords or unnecessary confidential documents.

12. Suspension and account closure

We may restrict access where reasonably necessary to address a security threat, unlawful activity, a material breach of these terms or loss of authority to use an account. Measures should be proportionate. Where lawful and practicable, we will explain the reason, provide a contact for review and allow an opportunity to remedy a remediable breach. Urgent protective action may need to precede notice.

Where a live procurement may be affected, we will take reasonable steps to coordinate with the buyer; suspension is not itself a procurement exclusion decision. You may request account closure using our contact details. Neither closure nor suspension automatically withdraws a submitted response, cancels a contract or deletes records that must lawfully be retained. Confirm any intended bid withdrawal through the applicable procurement process.

13. Exclusion of liability and supplier responsibility

Nothing in these terms excludes or limits liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation, or another liability which cannot lawfully be excluded or limited. Nothing removes statutory procurement remedies or data-protection rights.

Subject always to the preceding paragraph, to the fullest extent permitted by law, eSourcing Data Ltd excludes all liability to you arising out of or in connection with your access to, use of, or inability to use the free supplier Platform, whether in contract, tort (including negligence), breach of statutory duty, misrepresentation other than fraudulent misrepresentation, restitution or otherwise.

In particular, and subject to the same mandatory exceptions and limits of the law, we exclude liability for: loss of profit, revenue, business, contract, opportunity, anticipated savings, goodwill or reputation; bid-preparation and participation costs; loss or corruption of data; and indirect or consequential loss. The exclusions of the listed business and bidding losses apply whether the loss is direct or indirect and whether or not its possibility was notified to us.

Subject to the same exceptions, we accept no responsibility for a buyer's procurement documents, instructions, evaluation, award, cancellation or other decisions; your inaccurate or incomplete response; failure to complete submission before the applicable deadline; or services and systems operated by third parties. We do not undertake to verify every procurement statement or act as your legal, technical or bid adviser. You must make your own assessment and retain appropriate copies and records.

Each exclusion operates separately and only to the extent permitted by law. If an exclusion is ineffective, that does not extend another exclusion beyond its lawful scope or affect liabilities which cannot lawfully be excluded. These terms offer no supplier service credit, compensation promise or agreed monetary liability cap.

You will indemnify us for reasonable, properly incurred losses, damages and legal costs resulting from a third-party claim to the extent caused by your fraudulent or unlawful use of the Platform, knowing infringement of that third party's intellectual-property rights in material you supply, or deliberate unauthorised disclosure of its confidential information. This indemnity does not cover loss caused by our own negligence, breach of duty or unlawful conduct, any liability that cannot lawfully be transferred, or a settlement made without your reasonable consent. We will give you prompt notice where practicable, permit reasonable participation in the defence, and take reasonable steps to mitigate the loss.

14. Changes to terms

Each published version will carry a version identifier and be available to retain. This version applies to new supplier accounts which accept it at registration. Publishing it alone does not change the terms previously accepted by an existing account.

If we propose a later material change to your contract, we will explain it and seek any agreement required by law before treating it as binding. We will not treat an old acceptance record as acceptance of a later version or apply new terms retrospectively to accrued rights. These platform terms do not authorise changes to tender requirements or deadlines.

15. Complaints and disputes

Send platform-service complaints to info@esourcingdata.com, identifying the issue and desired resolution. Procurement complaints and challenges should be directed to the responsible buyer through its published arrangements; a platform complaint does not stop any statutory time limit. Personal-data complaints follow the separate privacy notice and do not remove the right to contact the ICO or seek a legal remedy.

These terms and contractual or non-contractual disputes arising from them are governed by the law of England and Wales. The courts of England and Wales have exclusive jurisdiction, subject to any mandatory rights or jurisdiction rules. Neither an internal complaint process nor informal discussions prevent urgent relief or use of applicable statutory remedies.

16. General

These terms concern platform access only and do not create a partnership, employment relationship or authority for you to bind us or a buyer. Failure to enforce a right on one occasion is not a waiver. If a provision is unenforceable, the remaining provisions continue so far as lawful. No transfer of the platform-access contract may reduce your mandatory rights. Other than as expressly agreed, no third party acquires a right to enforce these terms; this does not affect rights under a separate procurement contract.