Comments on: Is There An Opportunity to End Bid Shopping & Bid Peddling?

By: Charles F Cooper

Charles F Cooper — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 13:43:49 +0000

I strongly agree that these unethical practices should be controlled or eliminated. It is difficult however to legislate morals and ethics. Just look at the age old problem of prostitution. I do not like the idea of listing any subs execpt those of the MP&E trades. A typical bid day is hard enough as it is and adding another list of major subs is very troublesome. It erodes the precious time we have in the bidding process on bid day. We do not always agree with the lowest sub prices on certain trades and will plug in our own estimate. We will then negotiate with the lowest sub after award. With complicated combo bids and incompete scopes on sub bids it is extremely difficult on a busy bid day to be sure you made the right decision. We will cooperate and offer to give a sub list 24 hours later after the bid opening if we are the low bidder. This gives us a chance to shake out the combo bids and clear the scope with the low subs.

If you are going to mandate by law ethics concerning this matter then why not go a little further and demand that all sub bids be closed one hour before bid time to the GC’s or Prime’s and date, sealed and notarized. Any sub bids received after that deadline would not even be considered and tossed in the trash. Many years ago we did just this but the changing nature of construction bidding forced us to change if we wanted to stay in business. We are not bid shoppers. WE just do not agree with having to list subs based on our arguement above. We will not support this bill unless some real teeth are in it and not just more listing. This will not stop bid shopping.

By: David Mendes

David Mendes — Sat, 24 Apr 2010 21:31:49 +0000

The U.S. House of Representatives will consider an amendment this week to institute bid listing on federal construction contracts of $1 million or more. ASA is calling on opponents of bid shopping to contact their House members to support the Kanjorski Amendment to H.R. 5013. See http://bit.ly/97Mo0O.

By: Dawn

Dawn — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 20:31:41 +0000

It is staggering to hear the GC Estimators pawn off their own unethical and irresponsible behaviour on subs. Bis Shopping is unethical and should be ILLEGAL. If a sub is unqualified FIRE THEM or replace them . If you dont linke the frantic mess before bid time – Hey – here is a wild idea – TRY PUTTING A PREBID DEADLINE ON SUB QUOTES!!!

Thanks – and by the way – I bet youd be singing a different tune if you were the ones being bid shopped

By: Jim

Jim — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 12:56:14 +0000

I think requiring All Sub Contractors to Be qualified and Licensed is the first step.. there are too many Numbers thrown on bid day by well intentioned subs that do not have the Experience or the Qualifications to do the Project.

By: Don Short

Don Short — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 16:52:58 +0000

Here is a comment I received via email.

GREAT YOU WANT ANOTHER LAYER OF DEAD BEATS BEATING HONEST CONTRACTORS TO DEATH. WE ALREADY HAVE LAWS IN PLACE THAT “TAKE CARE OF THIS”

By: Don Short

Don Short — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 16:52:12 +0000

Here is another comment I received…

Another stupid law which will cost the taxpayer $$$$$. Most of the bid shopping occurs before the bids go in anyway. It is impossible to qualify a $100,000.00 sub bid minutes before your bid goes in anyway. Listing subs just makes the bid process more difficult and creates a lot of paperwork when subs back out of bids (which they do all the time on public bids. This law is a bad idea…..40 year estimator.

By: John Flor

John Flor — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:18:09 +0000

You are killing me with this over-simplistic so-called “solution” to bid shopping by putting yet another onerous requiement on the GCs.
The reality is that there is not enough time now to accurately handle all the bid day/bid form requirements, with the multitude of unit prices, alternates, and analyzation of dozens and dozens of literally last second major sub-bids.
All we need is to add yet another bid form requirement to list a bunch of subs who may or may not really be low bidders, while it is impossible to be sure with their 4 to 6 pages of fine print qualifications and alternative bid items. Sheesh.
If the SUBS would bid in a reasonable time frame and refuse to participate in the post bid games, the preponderance of the problem would go away.