Requiring several quotes on big purchases
Can a contractor insist on several supplier quotes above a set amount? What Achekam records today, what it cannot enforce yet, and a manual rule meanwhile.
By Achekam · · 5 min read · For Construction businesses in South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya
Most building firms have some version of the rule: small purchases can go to the usual merchant, but anything big needs competing quotes. Clients' quantity surveyors expect it, funders of public and donor-backed projects ask about it, and owners who have been burned by a cosy supplier relationship tend to insist on it.
The question is whether the software holds the line for you. In Achekam, the honest answer today is: partly. The app records quotations, the choice and the reasons in detail, but the setting that would force a number of quotations above an amount cannot be switched on from the app yet.
This article explains what is recorded, what is missing, and how to run the rule by hand until the setting arrives.
Why a quote threshold matters on site
On a construction job, buying decisions are spread across many people. Site agents, foremen, buyers and the contracts manager all order materials, plant hire and small subcontracts. Without a threshold, the person ordering decides how hard to look for a better price, and that depends on how busy they are and who they know.
A threshold makes the decision impersonal. Below the amount, one quotation will do. Above it, the buyer collects competing quotations before an order is raised. It protects the margin on the job, and it protects the buyer, because a documented comparison answers the question "why this supplier?" before anyone asks it. On public-sector work, the OECD's guide to preventing corruption in public procurement shows where corruption and fraud risks arise across the procurement cycle, from needs assessment and bid evaluation to invoices and contract execution, and how to prevent them.
What Achekam records today
The buying trail starts with a purchase requisition that says what is needed, why, and the estimated cost, and someone other than the requester approves or declines it.
Against an approved requisition, supplier quotations are captured and one is selected. If the selected quotation is not the cheapest, the buyer must write a reason, and the reason is kept. A quotation can also be disqualified with a reason, for example because it does not cover the specified product or leaves out delivery to site.
The purchase order is then raised from the selected quotation, and the person who raised it cannot approve it.
So for any purchase where quotations were collected, the comparison and the reasoning are on the record. What the app cannot do yet is insist that they are collected.
The threshold setting that is not there yet
A rule requiring a number of quotations above an amount cannot be switched on from the app. The server has a route for the policy, but no screen calls it, and the Policy tab only displays thresholds. Until a threshold exists, no purchase needs quotations, whatever its size.
In practice that means a buyer can raise a requisition for a large order of steel, capture a single quotation, select it and raise the order, and nothing in the app will stop them. The approvers will see that only one quotation was captured, but they have to notice it.
Split purchases, and the check that is waiting
The classic way around a quote threshold is to split one purchase into several smaller ones, each just under the limit. On site that can look innocent: one requisition for the ground-floor steel, another for the first floor, both raised on the same day for the same supplier.
Achekam sells a procurement integrity review as its own add-on. It raises questions about warning patterns, such as competing quotes that share contact or bank details, or a supplier paid into an employee's bank account. It also has a check for purchases split under a threshold, but that check does nothing until a threshold is set, which the app cannot do yet. Today the split-purchase check is silent for every business, and you should not rely on it.
A manual rule until thresholds exist
You can still run a threshold policy. It just has to live with people rather than in a setting. A workable version:
- Write the rule down. State the amount above which competing quotations are required, how many, and who may approve an exception. Keep it short enough to fit on one page.
- Make the requisition approver the first check. Before approving a requisition above the amount, the approver confirms the buyer knows quotations are needed.
- Make the order approver the second check. Before approving a purchase order above the amount, the approver opens the requisition and counts the captured quotations. If there are too few, the order goes back.
- Record exceptions as reasons. When there is only one possible supplier, such as a specialist product, the buyer captures that single quotation and the approver records why an exception was allowed.
- Review for splitting each month. Someone outside the buying team lists the month's orders by supplier and looks for several orders to the same supplier, close together, each just under the amount.
- Act on what you find. A pattern is a question for the buyer, not proof of wrongdoing. Ask, listen and record the answer.
Who does what
| Step | Who | What they check |
|---|---|---|
| Requisition | Site agent or buyer | Need, reason, estimated cost |
| Requisition approval | Contracts manager | Whether the amount needs competing quotes |
| Quotations | Buyer | Enough comparable quotes, reasons for the choice |
| Order approval | Someone other than the order's author | Number of quotations, written reasons |
| Monthly review | Owner or finance | Orders split across the threshold |
When the setting arrives
Once a threshold can be saved, the requirement moves from people to the app, and the integrity review's split-purchase check has something to measure against. Until then, the manual rule above is your control, and the written reasons Achekam keeps are your evidence that it was followed.
The rest of the buying trail is covered in buying materials: requisition to purchase order, and receiving in recording part deliveries to site.
Write your threshold rule this week, tell your approvers they are now the check, and diarise the first monthly split-purchase review.
General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.
