The opportunity to ask questions is one of the ways potential bidders can influence an acquisition. Normally bidders are invited to ask questions on both the Draft RFP and the Final RFP. The “when” is easy – AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. You certainly want to make every effort to meet the deadline in the RFP but that doesn’t mean if you miss it, you shouldn’t ask. The government is under no obligation to answer any question whether submitted on time or not but good questions that help clarify errors or uncertainties that could lead to complications in the evaluation and award process are usually welcomed and answered.
Members of your proposal team including your major subcontractors, pricing, program management, quality assurance and other functional areas should all review the RFP and draft questions. The more eyes the better, to make sure nothing is missed. Getting the team together to review the draft questions is also helpful and can be accomplished in a conference call. You want to avoid asking dumb questions, questions that are already answered somewhere in the RFP which is another reason to make it a group effort. Keep in mind that other bidders will be asking too so you’ll want to be as succinct as possible. Because answers will go to all potential bidders, you must be careful to not give away any proprietary or other information that you wouldn’t want a competitor to see (like your technical solution!).
If the government has provided a format for asking questions, you will use that. If not, the best way to present questions is in spreadsheet format with columns for:
1. Document Name, Section, Page No. in the RFP where the requirement that needs clarification can be found. This can be one column or multiple columns – whatever makes it easiest for the government to find.
2. The words or language that needs clarification (verbatim from the RFP).
3. Explanation for the confusion or why clarification is needed (optional in some cases).
4. Your question.
5. An empty cell for the answer.
How you pose the question is as important as the answer. Keep it simple if possible so an easy “yes” or “no” will answer it. I’ve always found that using the “Please confirm….” and then giving the answer you want is the best approach. For example, “Please confirm that resumes are excluded from the page count for the Technical Volume.” You will want to avoid asking in a way that a “yes” or “no” gives rise to more questions. Read your proposed question and consider if a simple “yes” or “no” tells you all you need to know. An example of one that doesn’t is “Will the government provide a ‘plug’ number for travel?” A “no” answer would not be helpful so another question might be “Please provide details on the amount of travel required – how many trips, location, and length of travel.”
While there is normally no harm in asking (worst case, they don’t answer), remember that they may be getting hundreds of questions and some are really important to your ability to provide a compliant, competitive proposal so you don’t want to inundate them with ones that are “nits.” For those minor things that don’t impact your solution or your price, you can state assumptions in your proposal that can be clarified during discussions prior to award or during execution if you win.