Recently, i was reading an article on the advantages of using a Schedule of Quantities for tendering by another Quantity Surveyor and i can across a phrase that caught my attention. It said “providing a schedule of quantities to Tenderers will generate more interest”…

More interest? Why would it do that?

My first thought was that by providing a s.o.q. Means the tenderer does not have the added cost of paying somebody else to measure all of the items and there quantities from the drawings.

That’s if they are a large enough company to have an estimator or afford to pay one to do this.

Secondly, the risk to the Tenderers is reduced as someone else has already quantified the job and identified the scope of works and all of the elements to produce the finished build.

All they need to do is put their rates in against each item listed.

So, just those two factors i feel would make a tender with a S.O.Q. Included more attractive to potential Tenderers.

The flip side of this for the Principle who has had to pay for the S.O.Q. , and this can put people off using them, is that given the above, that the tender is now more attractive and therefore would generate more interest, more tender submissions would be received than otherwise an there we have introduced the single most significant factor in reducing costs,  Competition.

Given that the cost of producing a S.O.Q. Is likely to be a fraction of one percent of the entire job cost, this increase in the competitiveness of tender prices compared to fewer number of competitive bids, should see the cost of the S.O.Q. Easily covered and more.

Not to mention the cost savings downstream as everyone is tendering their prices on a level playing field, lessening the amount of “have you priced this - no i didn’t “ conversations , ad nausium.. Etc .

Disclaimer; No A.I. was used in the writing of this blog, not even to proof read. It is printed here as it came out of my thoughts, warts, mistakes, opinions and all. Quite refreshing really!