Bid or no-bid: how to decide whether a federal solicitation is worth pursuing

1. Can you bid at all?

A single no here ends it, so these come first.

• The set-aside. Is the notice set aside for a group you belong to: small business, 8(a), HUBZone, service-disabled veteran-owned, or women-owned? If it is not set aside, you are competing with everybody.
• Your size under its NAICS code. The code on the notice carries a size standard of its own, and for a small business set-aside you must be small under that standard, which can differ from the one for your primary code.
• Your registration and certifications. An active SAM.gov registration, and any certification the set-aside depends on, current when the solicitation needs it to be. When certifications expire.
• The hard requirements. A facility clearance, a license, bonding, minimum insurance, a mandatory site visit on a date you cannot make. Each is written somewhere in the documents, and each is a no on its own.

2. Can you do the work well?

• The scope. Read the statement of work, not the title. Titles are short and statements of work are specific.
• Your past performance. Work you have done that is similar in size, scope and complexity, with references who will answer.
• Capacity. The people, equipment and cash to perform from the start date, alongside the work you already have.
• How much you may subcontract. On a set-aside, the limitations on subcontracting clause (FAR 52.219-14) caps how much of the contract you can pay to firms that are not similarly situated, so a plan that leans on a large partner may not qualify.

3. Can you win it?

• The incumbent. Who holds the work now, what they were paid and when their contract ends, from the award records on USASpending.gov. A recompete with a satisfied incumbent is a harder bid than new work.
• The competition. How many offers this agency usually receives for this kind of work, and how often one company keeps winning it. Federal award records report the number of offers received.
• How it is evaluated. Lowest price technically acceptable and best value trade-off are different bids, and Section M says which this is. Choose the ones that reward what you are good at.
• Whether you saw it coming. A notice you followed from a Sources Sought or a forecast gives you time to prepare that a notice met on the day it posted does not.

4. Can you win it at a price that works?

• What similar work has paid. Past awards for comparable work show the range the government has accepted.
• Wage determinations. On covered service and construction contracts your labor rates are set by law. What a wage determination means for your bid.
• The costs that hide in the documents. Bonds, insurance, travel, equipment, background checks and access lead times.

5. Is it worth the effort now?

Set the work a proposal will take against the days left before the deadline, and remember that the deadline for questions comes first, sometimes well before. Then set it against the other bids in your pipeline. A notice can be worth more than its value: a first contract with an agency, or past performance in work you want more of.

A simple score

One way to keep the decision honest: score each of the five questions above from 0 to 2, where 0 is no, 1 is maybe and 2 is yes. Any 0 in the first question ends it. Below about 6 out of 10, pass unless there is a strategic reason you can name. The number matters less than writing down the reason, every time.

Doing this faster

InstantSam answers several of these for you. On every notice its fit assessment says strong match, worth a look or probably not, with the reasons from your NAICS codes, set-asides, registration and the days left. On Professional, win likelihood gives a word with its reasons rather than a percentage, and the research shows who won work like this, what they were paid, how many offers the agency usually receives and when the incumbent’s contract ends. A document review finds the questions deadline and the hard requirements in the attachments.

The decision stays yours, and so does reading the requirement in the document before you rely on it. How InstantSam reads a solicitation.

Questions people ask

What is a bid/no-bid decision?

The decision, made before writing a proposal, whether a solicitation is worth the effort: whether you are eligible, whether you can do the work, whether you can win it, and whether you can win it at a price that works. It is made best in the first hour, from facts in the notice and its attachments.

How do I know whether I am small enough for a small business set-aside?

The NAICS code on the notice carries a size standard, a ceiling on average annual receipts or on employees, published by the SBA in 13 CFR 121.201. For a small business set-aside you must be small under that code's standard, which can differ from the standard for your own primary code.

How can I find out who holds a federal contract now?

Search the award records on USASpending.gov by agency and by the NAICS or product and service code. The current award shows the contractor, the amount and the period of performance, which tells you when the work is likely to be competed again.

See also: how to read a federal solicitation, and how to build a compliance checklist.