It is good procurement practice for evaluation team members to score submissions without any influence from their peers and colleagues.  Conversely, it is also good practice to hear people's views with different experiences and points of view.

The Consensus Evaluations feature allows:

  • Evaluators to score independently
  • The evaluation team to come together for final deliberations
  • An opportunity to correct ill-advised evaluation scores and comments with full transparency and accountability
  • An opportunity to incorporate the evaluations of people who, for whatever reason, were not able to complete the evaluation fully.

Only the Consensus Evaluator's scores for the weighted questions are used for the VFM (Value for Money) algorithm to rank each submission.

Step-by-step guide

To assign a consensus evaluator:

  1. Sign-in to https://360users.apetsoftware.com.au/ as the Request Manager
  2. From the main menu, click Requests
  3. Please navigate to the desired request from the list and open it
  4. Click on the  icon to open the Staff & Contractors view
  5. Select the desired evaluator from the Nominated Consensus Evaluator drop-down list (the consensus evaluator cannot also be part of the evaluation team)
  6. Switch Ready for consensus evaluation? to Yes when the evaluation team has done as much evaluating as possible
  7. Click Save
  8. Enter an Audit reason if required

The evaluation team will no longer be able to evaluate, and the rankings system will not include their scores or risk assessments.

To start an evaluation as a consensus evaluator:

  1. Sign-in to https://360users.apetsoftware.com.au/ as the Consensus Evaluator
  2. If using the new look:
    1. From the main menu, click Requests
    2. Click Closed / Awaiting Finalisation
    3. Click Evaluate against the desired request
  3. If using the old look:
    1. From the main menu, click Evaluation
    2. Select the desired request from the list
  4. Seed the consensus evaluation scores by clicking Adopt Others' Evaluations with options:
    1. Adopt Max Scores
    2. Adopt Min Scores
    3. Adopt Agreed Scores (recommended)
    4. Adopt Reasons (recommended)
  5. Evaluate by clicking either:
    1. One Provider at a Time - If evaluating multiple providers for one question at a time
      1. Select the desired provider
      2. Confirm 'I Have No Conflict of Interest' if required
    2. One Question at a Time - If evaluating multiple questions for one provider at a time
      1. Confirm 'I Have No Conflict of Interest' if required
      2. Select the desired section from the drop-down list
      3. Select the desired question from the drop-down list 
  6. Click on the  icon to see and optionally adopt the evaluation teams:
    1. Average score
    2. Individual:
      1. Scores
      2. Reasons
      3. Tags

      4. Risk assessments

  7. Amend the evaluations as appropriate
  8. Continue until the Finish option is available


Score and Risk are used in VFM (Value for Money) algorithm to rank the submissions. To learn more about the VFM algorithm, see: How does the VFM (value for money) algorithm work in 360?

Unweighted questions do not allow a score.  Questions with a weighting of 0% require a score; however, they have no impact on the rankings.

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