Tender Preparation & Submission
We offer tender preparation and submission for builders and subcontractors across New Zealand. We help put your tender response together, and can measure or price the work as you need.
Overview
When you need tender preparation
Tender preparation and submission means putting together a builder's or subcontractor's response to a construction tender that a client has issued. We help put the submission together, working from the drawings and tender documents you send. Builders and trade subcontractors use this service, and it's part of our measurement and estimating work.
You might need this when a tender arrives with drawings, a specification and a closing date, and you have to price it. On a major project, the tender documents can run to hundreds of pages. It also suits a subcontractor who's been asked to price one trade package and doesn't have long before the tender closes.
What we handle
What a construction tender response has to cover
Three things affect how a tender response is put together.
Priced from the drawings
When only drawings and a specification are issued, tender pricing starts with working out the scope and quantity of work. We can take off the quantities from the drawings and documents you send.
Pricing an issued schedule
Sometimes the client's quantity surveyor has already issued a measured list of the work, with a space for each rate. The quantities are already set, so only the rates need pricing, and we can help you with that.
Assumptions and qualifications
Where the documents are unclear or incomplete, the price has to rest on assumptions. Stating those assumptions plainly shows the client what the price is based on.
In New Zealand
The tender documents set the terms
The government's construction tendering guidance is written for agencies. It says tender documents should specify the method and timeframe for lodging a tender, and how long a tender stays valid. A private client sets its own terms in its tender documents.
What you get
A complete tender submission
You get the finished tender submission. We can price the work, or give you the quantities only if you'd rather apply your own rates.
You lodge it
You review it, decide the price and send it to the client.
Who this is for
This is for builders and trade subcontractors who've been asked to price a tender. That includes a subcontractor tender for one trade package and a builder's tender for a whole job.
If you're issuing a tender rather than responding to one, see tender documentation and analysis.
If you only need quantities and no tender is involved, take-off and estimating work is the better fit.
How it works
How tender preparation runs
- 01
Send the tender documents
Send us the drawings, specification and other tender documents, and tell us the closing date.
- 02
We confirm the job
We let you know whether we can help.
- 03
We put the response together
We measure, price and assemble the response from the documents you sent.
- 04
You review it
Nothing goes to the client until you've checked it.
Why AMS
Why builders and subcontractors use us for tenders
Built around the tender documents
Because the response answers what the documents ask for, you don't have to guess what a complete submission looks like.
Your time goes on the price
We assemble the submission, which leaves you free to spend your time on the price you'll commit to.
A quantity surveyor when you don't have one
A trade subcontractor may not have a qualified quantity surveyor in the business. We take on the measuring, so you can respond to the tender while your team gets on with its own work.
Frequently asked questions
What does tender preparation and submission include?
It includes the measuring or pricing, the assumptions behind the price, and the submission itself, prepared to follow the tender's instructions. Each tender's documents set out what its response has to contain.
Is this the same as tender documentation and analysis?
No, the two are for opposite sides of a tender. Our tender documentation service is for the client issuing the tender, and this one is for the builder or subcontractor pricing it.
Can I include tender qualifications and assumptions?
It depends on the tender, because its documents say whether qualifications are allowed. Check the instructions before you add any. If a clause is unclear, ask about it in the way the documents set out. On GETS, the government tender site, questions go to the purchasing agency.
Do you lodge the tender submission for us?
No, you lodge it yourself. On GETS, for example, your response only reaches the purchasing agency once you click Commit to submit it.
What if the tender documents change while I'm pricing?
Send us any addendum you receive, so the work matches the latest set of documents. An addendum is an update issued after a tender has been published. Government guidance says the tender period should be extended where an addendum materially affects the tender.
Need a quantity surveyor for your next project?
Send through your plans or a short description of the project and we will come back to you.