Bidders are required to submit any request for clarification or any question in respect of this ToR by e-mail to . The deadline for receipt of questions is 3 August 2016.

Annex A: Terms of Reference

RFP/PSFR/2016/037
Provision of service to conduct research for UNHCR’s prospect and existing donors

20July 2016
Reference: RFP/PSFR/2016/037

Table of Contents

1Introduction

1.1Background

1.2Purpose of Research

2Requirements

2.1General Objective

2.2Other services, required for the performance of the key requirements

2.3Optional

2.4Customer Responsibilities

2.4.1Current profiles of UNHCR’s donor base

2.4.1.1F2F Donors

2.4.1.2Online Donors

2.4.1.3Facebook community

2.4.2Reference

3Content of the Technical Offer

3.1Personnel Qualifications

3.2Vendor Registration Form

3.3Applicable General Conditions

4Evaluation

4.1Technical Evaluation

5Key Performance Indicators

5.1Performance Evaluation

1Introduction

1.1Background

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) was established in 1950 with the mandate to provide international protection and find durable solutions to over 60 million people worldwide. These people were forced to flee from homes and find themselves as refugees, internally displaced people or stateless and need support from citizens of the world. In Thailand, UNHCR supports 106,000 refugees who have been living in nine camps in four provinces for over 30 years. We provide vocational training to enhance self-reliance, rehabilitation centres for children with disabilities and resettlement in third countries so that refugees can start new lives. UNHCR launched its first Private Sector Fundraising (PSFR) campaign in Thailand using the Face to Face (F2F) Fundraising approach since mid-2008. The programme became the core income generation activity for UNHCR’s operation in Thailand, generating about 22,000 committed giving donors (donors who give on a regular monthly or six-monthly basis).

In 2016, PSFR Thailand implemented a strategy to diversify its fundraising portfolio to cover additional face to face fundraising channels and digital fundraising approaches. We need to establish who our best prospect target audiences are across all channels and what key messages are most likely to influence their decision to donate and become UNHCR’s committed giving donors. Our current insights are limited to age and payment type whereby credit card donors deliver the best long term value and this value also increases as the age of the donor increases with donors over 25 currently being the lowest threshold for targeting.

PSFR Thailand is also lacking a deep understanding of its donors and wishes to find out more in order to retain them longer and, where possible, increase the annual value that each donor delivers to UNHCR. Currently we only group donors by ‘type’ based on the status of their payment, using the following categories as of April 2016:

  • New regular givers:Any donors recruited in the current financial year with no previous financial history with UNHCR. They signed up with a regular commitment of either a monthly, six-monthly or annual payment frequency.
  • Active regular givers:Are donors recruited in previous years and continue to provide regular, ongoing donations. There are over 22,000donors mainly recruited via face to face fundraising
  • Lapsed regular givers:Were active regular givers but their payments have either beencancelled or cannot be deducted, mainly due to the insufficient funds. There are 40,000 lapsed donors, all from the face to face fundraising programme
  • One-time donors: Are donors that have given single donations at least once i.e. Thy have never set up a regular commitment to UNHCR. There are XXX on the database, some who have given in the last 12 months and many whose last donation was at least a year ago and often much longer

More information can be found on UNHCR globally; and about UNHCR Thailand

1.2Purpose of Research

The purpose of this Request for Proposal is to conduct research in order to understand UNHCR’s potential and existing donors:

  • To gain motivational, values/needs based and quantitative insights into UNHCR’s prospect and existing donor base and create deeper segmentations based on the findings. This would start by evaluating UNHCR current key donor groups of active committed givers recruited from F2F and online channels, lapsed committed givers and prospects
  • To understand the perception of UNHCR and refugee issues within the segmentation and their main triggers for responding and donating to UNHCR, supporting UNHCR over the long term and also cancelling their donation
  • To use these insights to develop relevant propositions and messages that would resonate with the audiences and their needs /or values
  • To understand the relationship, interaction and influence between each segmentation in order to design comprehensive fundraising strategies that improve donor acquisition and retention programmes
  • To identify ideas for new prospect donor groups based on the research
  • To test UNHCR’s existing key messages, campaigns and materials among each group and gain suggestions on how to make them more relevant

UNHCR may award Frame Agreement(s) with a tentative duration of 12 months from August 2016 to July 2017.UNHCR may, at its discretion, award multiple contracts to several companies.

The research will be conducted in Thailand, for UNHCR PSFR Thailand office.

The UNHCR expects to achieve the following;

  • Increase retention rates of active committed givers by 10% during the first 12 months of their relationship with us
  • Increase the value of existing donors by 5 % through the annual upgrade programme and lower payment delinquency
  • Increase the reactivation rate of lapsed donors to their committed gift from 3% to 6%
  • Improve new donor conversion rates through face to face and telemarketing fundraising approaches by 10%

2Requirements

2.1General Objective

The purpose of this Request for Proposal isto identify profiles, motivations, values and segmentations of existing, new, lapsed and potential donors for UNHCR Thailand in order to improve acquisition and retention rates and long term donor value

2.2Other services, required for the performance of the key requirements

  • Propose research methodology and tools which will deliver the objectives
  • Directly or through third part relationships provide all human resources, materials, technical skills and translation services required to deliver the project
  • Provide and present in face to face meetings comprehensive reports from the insights gained from conducting the research, including evidence to support the findings in the form of data analysis, quotes from individuals and the key types of language used by participants
  • Propose recommendations for how to use the findings to benefit future development of UNHCR’s fundraising strategies

2.3Optional

  • Propose targeting opportunities, propositions and message development
  • Validate propositions with identified donor segments

2.4Customer Responsibilities

UNHCR PSFR Thailand will provide access to the donor database in order to conduct the research. Suppliers will be requested to sign adeclaration of confidentiality.

The following data fields are available:

General information

  • Gender
  • Date of birth

Contact information fields

  • Address
  • Phone number
  • Occupation
  • Email address
  • Social media address

Financial History

  • Payment type (monthly, six monthly, annual, one-time)
  • Payment method (credit card, debit card, auto-debit, bank transfer)
  • Payment value (instalment, value)
  • Payment start date
  • Payment end date
  • Number of attempted debits
  • Number of successful debits
  • Total value of successful debits

2.4.1Current profiles of UNHCR’s donor base

2.4.1.1F2F Donors

Existing Donors (F2F)

There are over22,000 regulargiving donors recruited from F2F fundraising. About 60% of them are women aged 30-45 years old who donate through credit card about 400-500 Baht per month. From the research findings in 2011, our existing donors graduate with a Bachelor’s degree and higher. Most of them are company employees or business owners. Their reason to support UNHCR is mainly because they feel sympathy to refugees. Our donors tend to support UNHCR for about two years. We assume that UNHCR’s donors are more open minded and interested in international affairs than the general public.

Lapsed Donors (F2F)

There are about 38,000 donors who have cancelled their active donations or whose credit card could not be deducted for three months since their most recent payment. About 60% of them are women aged 26-45 years old who used to donate 300-400 Baht per month. According to the research in 2011, lapsed donors said they were satisfied with UNHCR but feel distant to the brand. The reason that they stop donating is because they want to donate to other charities but they are willing to donate in an adhoc manner in case there is natural disaster or refugee crisis. Mostly, people tend to cancel their donation during the first 6-12 months of their donation period.

2.4.1.2Online Donors

Digital fundraising is new for UNHCR and donor volumes are therefore low (although this is a priority growth area). The current profile appears the same as for face to face fundraising donors. Around 80% are women, 35-45 years old interested in travel, real estate, art and entertainment.

2.4.1.3Facebook community

UNHCR Thailand has 87,000 likes and growing. There are 40% of FB community who are female aged 35-44 years. About 70% of the community live in Bangkok. Engagement rates are strong and the community active. UNHCR would be happy to use Facebook as a research channel if considered appropriate.

2.4.2Reference

UNHCR conducted quantitative and qualitative research in 2011. Highlights of the research findings are as follows;

  • In overall, ‘Children’ is the issue which a majority of donors are willing to financially, followed by ‘Handicapped/ disabled’, ‘Elderly’, ‘Disaster relief’, and ‘Education’.
  • Main reasons to support each charity organization are along main issues/ problems that each organization is in charge of:
  • UNHCR: Helps refugees, Helps refugees to get habitat
  • Red Cross: Helps poor patients, Helps patient who need blood
  • UNICEF: Helps underprivileged children, Helps underprivileged children for education
  • WSPA: Supports animal brutality prevention, Helps animals to get food/ habitat, Helps disabled/ injured animals
  • CCF & World Vision: Helps underprivileged children, Helps underprivileged children for education, Helps underprivileged children for food (for CCF only)
  • Ruamkatunyu Foundation: Wants to help the poor, Helps the pauper that could not afford coffin
  • ‘Wants to donate/make merit’ is another reason to support Red Cross, CCF, and Ruamkatunyu Foundation.
  • Understanding of refugees is unclear and mixed with people who flee from natural disasters and are not refugees and also with stateless people (people who no longer have a nationality)
  • Face to face fundraising has had the biggest impact on the awareness of UNHCR in Thailand and is the biggest source of information for the general public
  • 57% of active donors think they have a close relationship with UNHCR while lapsed donors don’t feel close but claim they are satisfied with UNHCR
  • Natural disasters and refugee crises will trigger the reactivation of lapsed donors
  • Thais are rather passive in giving a donation. They seldom look out for information or donation opportunities themselves. Usually they wait for the information to come to them.
  • When it comes to a donation, it is important for Thais to witness or see the work of the non-profit organization (NPO), whether that is through mass media, eye-witness, or organizational communications.
  • In general, Thais give priority to Thai people. When it comes to a donation, they are likely to donate to NPOs or issues related to Thai people first. However, only UNHCR donors tend not to discriminate between Thais and others.
  • Further information available for successful vendor.

3Content of the Technical Offer

  • Proposal on methodology of the research and types of research
  • Work plan to demonstrate how to implement the proposal
  • Proposed timeline of the project
  • Company Qualifications
  • A description of your company with evidence of your company’s capacity to perform the services required, including:
  • Company profile, registration certificate and last audit reports
  • If a multi-location company, please specify the location of the company’s headquarters, and the branches that will be involved in the project work with founding dates
  • Three or more letters of reference, with contact information
  • Advanced and professional work experience and proven track record in conducting research in commercial and non-profit sectors in Thailand.
  • Comprehensive knowledge of various research methodologies and trends in conducting research
  • Strong analytical and organizational skills, thoughtfulness and discretion
  • The bidder’s proven eligibility to work in Thailand
  • Proven track record of conducting fundraising project for other non-profit organizations
  • All license/ permission costs to be borne by supplier.

3.1Personnel Qualifications

Please describe the structure of your team and list the proposed personnel (staff members) to be dedicated to work on the project. A short CV of team members are to be attached.

3.2Vendor Registration Form

If your company is not already registered with UNHCR, please complete, sign, and submit with your Technical Proposal the Vendor Registration Form (Annex C).

3.3Applicable General Conditions

Please indicate your acknowledgement of the UNHCR General Conditions of Contract for the Provision of Services by signing this document (Annex D) and including it in your submitted Technical Proposal.

4Evaluation

4.1Technical Evaluation

The Technicaloffer will be evaluated using inter alia the following criteria and percentage distribution: 70% from the total score.

Company Qualifications /
  • Capacity to undertake contract
  • Previous experience in conducting research for other UN agencies or international NGOs will be an advantage
  • Dedicated team for UNHCR
  • Proven eligibility to work in Thailand

Proposed Services /
  • Research methodology suitable for requirement
  • Content of the Proposal reflects understanding with the RFP
  • Proposed suitable timeline

Personnel Qualifications /
  • Previous experience in conducting research
  • Good structured team

Bidders must have a minimum technical threshold of 49 out of 70 points for the technical proposal in order to be considered further for the financial evaluation.

5Key Performance Indicators

5.1Performance Evaluation

UNHCR expects to monitor the performance of the selected supplier.

  • Increase retention rates of active committed givers by 10% during the first 12 months of their relationship with us
  • Increase the value of existing donors by 5 % through the annual upgrade programme and lower payment delinquency
  • Increase the reactivation rate of lapsed donors to their committed gift from 3% to 6%
  • Improve new donor conversion rates through face to face and telemarketing fundraising approaches by 10%

Page 1 of 10