Sealed Bid Procedures . A sealed bid purchase involves competitive bids and public opening of bids. Negotiated Procurements . The most flexible, but sometimes most complicated, method for procuring goods and services is negotiation. This approach is used when contracting officers can not define all of the requirements of a procurement or when other than price are important enough to require evaluation.
Negotiated procurements take many forms.
They may call for competitive proposals, and may involve restricted competition, or sole source.