Tendering and award
The market only returns comparable prices when everyone is pricing the same thing. That is what a tender file is for.
Why bids are often not comparable
Three bids thirty percent apart almost never mean three differently priced contractors. They usually mean three different readings of the same text: different equipment quality, ancillary work excluded, commissioning not included, different quantity assumptions.
A clean file closes those gaps: quantities are given, equipment schedules are named, ancillary work is listed, balancing is explicitly owed. After that, a price difference is a price difference again.
How it runs
Selection of the firms to invite by size and track record, issue, a written query process answered to everyone alike, opening with a record, technical clarification, a comparison table and an award report with reasons. The report also states what the lowest price does not include.
What drives cost after award
- Incomplete quantities
- Variations appear exactly where the file was silent.
- Late coordination
- A route that clashes with another gets resolved expensively on site.
- Unclear interfaces
- Who supplies, who installs, who connects — that belongs in the file, not in a meeting.
- No acceptance criteria
- Without defined measured values, work cannot be rejected.
Questions about tendering
How many firms should be invited?
Three to five, carefully chosen. More reduces the response rate, because contractors will not invest in a process they think they cannot win.
Do you award on our behalf?
No. We recommend and justify; the decision stays with the client. The award report is written so that it stands up in front of a board.
Can you review a bid we already have?
Yes. That is a short mandate, quoted separately: we read the bid against the building and tell you what is missing.
A project that needs a technical opinion?
Tell us the building and the stage it is at. You will get an assessment and a fixed fee per phase, with no obligation.