Overview
The Truth in Negotiations Act (TINA) mandates that contractors provide certified cost or pricing data to the government when the contract value surpasses a specified threshold. However, there are certain situations where contractors may be exempt from this requirement, referred to as TINA exemptions.
You can use TechnoMile's TINA Certification feature to effectively streamline TINA management processes. This document is a step-by-step guide on how you can use the TINA Certification feature in your organization.
Audience
Pre-award Users
Prerequisites
Ensure that TechnoMile's Contracts Suite is already installed and configured. The version of this package must be 2025.2 or higher.
TINA Certification Process
NOTE
Once the negotiations are completed, you can move to the TINA Certification phase.
This section explains how TINA certifications are created within the system:
Auto-Generation of TINA certification: When a Proposal is approved, and the TINA Exemption field is set to NONE, a TINA certification record is automatically generated.
Manually Creating a TINA certification: In cases where a certification is not auto-generated, users can manually create a new TINA certification record as needed.
Auto-Generation of TINA Certification
To view an auto generated TINA certification:
Login to your Microsoft Dynamics instance.
Go to Proposals and open a Proposal record.
For the TINA certification to be auto generated, the following conditions must be met in the Proposal record:
The Proposal Status must be Approved.
The TINA Exemption field must be set to None.
Go to TINA Certifications.
The auto generated TINA certification is available here.
Manually Creating a TINA Certification
To manually create a TINA certification from a Proposal:
Open a Proposal record, then go to the TINA Certifications tab.
Click New TINA Certification.
Enter all the mandatory fields marked with a red asterisk (*), then click Save.
The TINA certification is created.
To manually create an individual TINA certification:
Go to TINA Certifications and click New.
Enter all the mandatory fields marked with a red asterisk (*), then click Save.
The TINA certification is created.
TINA Field Descriptions
Field Name | Description |
|---|---|
TINA ID | A unique identifier for the TINA certification record. |
TINA Status | Indicates the current status of the TINA certification. |
Admin Office | The customer’s administrative office to which the TINA certification letter must be submitted. |
Proposal | The proposal associated with the TINA certification, when applicable. |
Admin Office Code | Code representing the location of the customer's administrative office. |
Opportunity | The opportunity linked to the proposal for which this TINA certification is generated. |
Contracting Officer | The contracting officer who will receive the TINA certification letter and documentation. |
Solicitation Number | The solicitation number, pulled from the related proposal record. |
Submitted to Customer | Indicates whether the TINA certification letter and documentation have been submitted to the customer. |
Previous Pricing Sweep | References the most recent TINA certification previously conducted for the related record (proposal or contract). |
Negotiation Conclusion | Date (day, month, year) when price negotiations were finalized and agreement was reached, or the closest practicable date agreed upon. |
Is this an LOE Proposal | Specifies whether the contract involves a Level of Effort (LOE) requirement. |
Date Submitted | The date the TINA certification was submitted to the customer's administrative office. |
Document Status | The current status of the TINA documentation and analysis required for submission. |
Date Of Execution | Date (day, month, year) when the TINA certification was executed. |
Purpose | Indicates whether the TINA certification is for a proposal, contract, modification, or Subcontract. For more details, refer to Mandatory Fields Based on TINA Certification Purpose. |
Signed | Information about who is expected to sign the certification and the expected signing date. |
Contract | The contract associated with the TINA certification, when applicable. |
Contract Modification | The contract modification associated with the TINA certification, if applicable. |
Subcontract | The subcontract associated with the TINA certification, when applicable. |
Subcontract Mod | The subcontract modification associated with the TINA certification, if applicable. |
Sweep Explanation | A summary of findings and conclusions from the sweep analysis and certification documentation. |
Auto-Populated Fields in TINA Certification Records
When a TINA certification record is generated (automatically or manually), certain fields are auto populated using values from the related object record.
For instance, if the TINA certification is generated from a Proposal, the following fields are auto populated:
Admin Office
Admin Office Code
Contracting Officer
NOTE
If multiple Contracting Officers are listed under the External POCs of the Proposal, one of them will be randomly assigned as the Contracting Officer in the TINA certification record.
Document Status
TINA ID
Opportunity
Proposal
Purpose
Submitted to Customer
TINA Status
NOTE
If a field in the related object record has no value, the corresponding field in the TINA certification will display as None.
Mandatory Fields Based on TINA Certification Purpose
The Purpose field specifies the type of entity for which the TINA certification is created. Based on the selected purpose, different fields become mandatory and are indicated with a red asterisk (*).
When the Purpose field is set to:
Pre-Award: The Proposal field becomes mandatory and must be populated to save the record.
For Award: The Contract field becomes mandatory and must be populated to save the record.
For Subcontract: The Subcontract field becomes mandatory and must be populated to save the record.
For Modification: Both Contract Modification and Subcontract Modification fields are initially marked as mandatory. However, once a value is entered in either field, the other is no longer required.
Email Notification Upon Creation of a TINA Certification
When a TINA certification is created, the Proposal Owner receives an email notification with a direct link to access the TINA certification record.
TINA Certification Approval Process
Adding Approvers
To add approvers:
Open the TINA certification record and go to the TINA Team tab.
Click New Team Member.
In the Quick Create Team Member window, select the Role as Approver, choose an Employee, and enter the Sequence number.
Click Save and Close.
An Approver is added.
Submitting for Approval
To submit the TINA Certification for approval:
Open the TINA certification record, then under Actions, click Send for Approval.
A confirmation message appears, click OK.
The Business Process Flow (BPF) stage moves from Not Started to Sweep Completed.
NOTE
If you attempt to initiate the Send for Approval process while the Document Status field is set to Not Started, an error message appears prompting you to update the status to Completed before proceeding.
If you initiate the Send for Approval process while the Document Status field is set to In Progress, the approval process will begin, and the Document Status field will be automatically updated to Completed.
Approving/Rejecting the TINA Certification
The TINA certification approval request can be directly accepted or rejected over an Email Notification, allowing approvers to take action without the need to access the system.
When a TINA sweep approval request is approved, the BPF advances to the Approved stage. When an approval request is rejected, the BPF moves to the Rejected stage.
Upon rejection, set the TINA Status back to Not Started, update the record based on the approvers feedback, and resubmit it to restart the approval process.
Generating the TINA Letter
Once the TINA certification is approved, you can generate the TINA letter.
To generate the TINA letter:
Open the TINA certification record, then under Actions, click Generate TINA Letter.
A confirmation message appears, click OK.
Go to Related tab and select Documents.
The generated TINA letter is available in the Documents tab.
Click the link to open the TINA letter in a new window.
Also, an email is sent to the proposal owner containing a direct link to access the TINA Letter. 
Go back to the TINA certification record, set the TINA Status field to Submitted To Customer and specify the Date Submitted.
Click Save.
The BPF stage moves from Approved to Submitted to Customer.
NOTE
The Date Submitted field in the TINA certification record is mapped to the TINA Submitted Date field in the related Proposal record. When the TINA is submitted, this date is automatically populated in the Proposal.
If you attempt to initiate the Send to Customer process while the Document Status field is set to Not Started, an error message appears prompting you to update the status to Completed before proceeding.
If you initiate the Send to Customer process while the Document Status field is set to In Progress, the approval process will begin, and the Document Status field will be automatically updated to Completed.
Closing the TINA Certification
Once the TINA certification is submitted to the customer, its status is automatically updated based on the Proposal's Closed Reason.
If the proposal's closed reason is:
Awarded: The TINA status is set to Closed-Awarded.
No-Bid: The TINA status is set to Rejected.
Lost, Cancelled, Complete No Award, Expired Validity, Superseded, or Withdrawn:
If the TINA status is Approved or Submitted to Customer, it is updated to Closed-Not Awarded.
For all other statuses, it is set to Rejected.
NOTE
If the TINA status is already Rejected, it will not be updated by any automated process.
When a proposal is Approved, the Date Of Execution field in the TINA record is auto populated from the TINA Date Of Execution field in the Proposal record.
Video: Pre-Award on Microsoft Dynamics - TINA Certification Workflow
Learn how to manage TINA efficiently using the Pre-Award module. This video covers the complete workflow from creation to submission, approval, and tracking.