A bid manager preparing a submission this month asked us a direct question: if the buyer finds out we used AI, are we out? The short answer is no. The longer answer is more useful, because what actually gets bids excluded has nothing to do with the drafting tool and everything to do with what the tool produced.
What the rules say
Start with the legislation. In Ireland, the European Union (Award of Public Authority Contracts) Regulations 2016 (S.I. No. 284 of 2016) transpose Directive 2014/24/EU and set out the exclusion grounds - mandatory ones such as conviction for specified offences, and discretionary ones such as grave professional misconduct or serious misrepresentation. In the UK, the Procurement Act 2023, in force since 24 February 2025, runs its own exclusion and debarment regime.
Neither instrument mentions AI-assisted drafting. Nor does the standard Irish RFT template, nor the eTenders process, nor - for now - the typical UK invitation to tender. There is no rule under which “this bid was written with ChatGPT” is itself a ground for exclusion. You can use AI to write a tender; the question is what you submit.
What is starting to appear in tender documents
The picture is not static. Today, nothing in the standard machinery asks about AI in either direction - no supplier declaration, no buyer-side statement about evaluation. That gap is exactly what BidReview’s report on AI in Irish public procurement documents, and the model wording to close it has been drafted for adoption. Expect AI clauses to reach the packs you answer, in two kinds.
Disclosure clauses. A request to state whether and how AI was used in preparing the submission. Done properly, these are informational: the answer is not scored, and the point is that a named human confirms every claim is accurate and stands behind the whole submission. That is the model BidReview has proposed - ask, don’t score - and how to answer a disclosure question is a topic of its own.
Conditions and warranties. Clauses confirming that all statements of fact are accurate, that described experience, personnel and certifications are real and available as described, and that responsibility for the content rests with the tenderer whatever its method of production. Read those words carefully: they do not ban AI. They make the consequences of unverified AI output contractual.
If an RFT you are answering carries an AI clause - and some will, before any of this is standardised - answer it honestly and exactly. A false declaration is a misrepresentation, and misrepresentation is a discretionary exclusion ground in both jurisdictions. The exposure is never the tool. It is the lie about the tool.
What actually gets AI-assisted bids into trouble
In the bids we audit, the disqualification-grade risks from AI drafting are the ordinary ones, industrialised.
Fabricated content. A model that invents a contract reference, a certification, or a named client to fill a gap has produced a serious misrepresentation - the classic discretionary exclusion territory. Verify every figure and reference before submission; a buyer can check references, and increasingly does.
Non-compliance dressed as compliance. AI produces answers that look responsive while missing a mandatory requirement stated in the pack - a certification held at bid date, a signed declaration, a pricing template completed in the required form. Fluency hides the gap from the author. It does not hide it from the compliance check.
Breaching stated limits. Page limits, word counts and mandatory formats are the cheapest exclusions in procurement, and generated text is verbose by default.
Every one of these would sink a hand-written bid too. AI just makes them easier to commit at speed and harder to notice in your own document.
The takeaway
No procurement rule in Ireland or the UK disqualifies a bid for being AI-written. Bids get excluded for what has always excluded them: misrepresentation, missed mandatory requirements, and broken submission rules - all of which unreviewed AI output produces more efficiently than any human ever did. Answer AI clauses honestly, verify everything the model touched, and put a named person behind every claim.
Check the disqualification risks before the buyer does. BidReview runs a forensic compliance audit of your finished bid against the RFT - exclusion risks flagged and classified before you submit. Run the free scorecard →
