Most Requests for Proposal (RFPs) offer the opportunity for potential bidders to ask questions about the RFP. There is no obligation on the part of the government to answer and often when they do it is so close to the submittal deadline that it creates a scramble to make the changes in your proposal to incorporate the new information. However, the opportunity to ask can be very important and should not be missed where there are real inconsistencies or lack of definition in the RFP.
What can we as bidders do to make the Q&A as effective as possible?
- Reference the section and page in the RFP from which the subject of your question arises. If you have the opportunity to provide your own template for questions, a spreadsheet with columns that include: RFP Section, RFP Page No., Requirement, Question, and Answer. The Requirement is the quoted portion of the RFP and the Answer column is blank for the government to fill-in. If the template provided by the government does not include the RFP Section and Page No, include that in your question.
- Don’t ask questions that are already answered in the RFP. It doesn’t reflect well on you and creates unnecessary work for the government. A thorough review of the questions by your proposal team can eliminate many questions by talking through them. One member of the team may know or be able to find the answer within the RFP.
- Be careful in creating your questions to avoid anything that identifies your company or your proposed solution or approach. Because the Q&A will be distributed to all bidders you don’t want to give anything away to the competition. Consider carefully if the answer to your question will give a competitor something they may not have thought of.
- Keep your questions simple. Don’t try to ask too much in each question. If you do, you may get only a partial answer. Better to submit separate questions. Wherever possible ask a question that can be answered with a simple yes or no.
- Finally, craft your questions when you can to get the answer you want. Examples: “Please confirm that the Travel and ODC costs provided in the RFP Section L.3 on Page 31 are inclusive of all allowable contractor burdens.” Or “Please confirm that resumes are not included in the page count of Volume II (RFP Section L.2.4, page 25).”
Be judicious in preparing questions. If there are 10 potential bidders and each bidder submits 10 questions, that’s 100 questions the government has to deal with and you will have to review and incorporate in your response if they choose to answer. Simple questions asked by multiple bidders can be combined and reduced to a single answer. Complex questions are not so easily dealt with. Aiding the government by making it as easy as possible to answer increases the probability of not just getting a response but getting one that is useful and sooner rather than later.