The Customer Proposal is the ultimate result of the entire bidding process of a Project. In RedTeam Flex, this process begins when a Project is created. Uploading plans & specs, requesting quotes (RFQs), issuing addendums, and putting together a cost estimate and ultimately a total contract price are all integral parts of this process that finally lead to producing a Proposal to submit to a customer.
You can prepare and manage your Proposal in Step 7 of the Project Setup form.
1. Add Clarification or Alternate to a Proposal
A Proposal is a formal, written offer from a bidding company to the Customer that outlines all intended services and materials and includes written prices and quotes, specifications, etc. This Proposal document may also include Clarifications about the scope of work and/or Alternates to be reviewed and possibly selected by the customer. Should a Customer accept an Alternate, you will go back to the Estimate and adjust it accordingly to reflect the Alternate.
In RedTeam Flex, you can choose from a list of default Clarifications to add to a Proposal (these defaults can be managed in the Configuration menu), or you can enter Clarifications/Alternates specific to a particular Project.
Steps:
From the Project Home menu, select Prepare & Submit Proposal
Scroll down to locate the Clarifications/Alternates section, and click + Add Clarifications/Alternates
Use the checkboxes to select from the default Clarifications and/or enter a Project-specific Clarification or Alternate, click Save when you are ready.
2. Link/Unlink Proposal to Estimate
When a Project Proposal is linked to the Estimate, you use the cost code descriptions and their amounts from the Cost Estimate step to build your Proposal scope of work and total proposed amount.
You can pull in items from the Estimate to be listed in the scope of work on the Proposal by clicking Add Scope Items and selecting the ones you want to display. The
Proposed Amount, pulls directly from the Total Price at the bottom of the Cost Estimate. You can adjust this amount from the Cost Estimate Step.
Unlinking the Proposal from the Estimate is used when you do not wish to put together a cost estimate for a Project. This option allows you to manually enter a scope of work and the proposed amount to be displayed on the Proposal. Unlinking means you will not have an Estimate column on your Project Budget and you will need to build the Budget from scratch should you be awarded the contract and move forward with the Project.
Steps:
From the Project Home menu, select Prepare & Submit Proposal
Scroll down to locate the scope of work section, By default, the Proposal is Linked to the Estimate
To Unlink, click UNLINK FROM ESTIMATE
3. Add Scope Items to the Contract
RedTeam Flex gives users the option to link their Proposal directly to the Estimate. Of course, sometimes you want to add or remove items that were included in the Estimate. These items can be added, edited or removed right from the Contract tab, rather than from the Estimate. This process can only take place while the Project or Customer Change is in Request status.
Steps:
In the Proposal Details section, locate the items linked to the Estimate, Click + Scope Items
Click the checkboxes to select Scope Items, then click Save.
4. Edit the Proposal Scope of Work
You have the option of displaying estimated costs in one of four ways on your proposal: by cost division, by cost code, by assembly, and by work description.
By Cost Division: Sorting by cost division will group all costs according to their greater cost division ( 01 - General Requirements, 02 - Site Construction, 03 - Concrete, etc..)
By Cost Code: Sorting by cost code will break out the costs according to their individual cost codes. This is the most common selection.
By Assembly: Group your estimate costs according to the individual assemblies you created while building the estimate.
Work Description: Choosing this option will give you a text field you can use to create a narrative of all the work that will be completed. You can use the text narrative in place of the cost detail which was created on the estimate.
Steps:
From the Step 7 of the Project Setup form, Scroll down to the Link to Estimate section and select the scope of work you would like to use.
Any change made to the form will autosave once you are done.
5. Enter the Proposed Duration on a Proposal
One of the most important aspects of this Proposal is the Proposed Duration or the amount of time you propose it will take to complete the entire scope of work as it is outlined.
The Proposed Duration is required to move a Project in RedTeam Flex from Request to Proposal status.
Steps:
From the Project Home menu, select Prepare & Submit Proposal
Enter the Proposed Duration in calendar days in the Proposed Duration field. The number is auto-saved upon input.
6. Select Proposal Attachments
In RedTeam Flex, you can request, receive, and enter much of this information (i.e. Plans & Specs, Vendor Quotes, Unit Prices) during the bidding phase, while a Project is in Request status. To include many of these items on the Proposal document, you can use the Attachments section to select what you would like to display.
Perhaps the most important attachment for consideration is the Schedule of Values. Often the SoV is created as the Proposal is being prepared. For more information, see the Schedule of Values article.
For documentation and attachments not yet stored in RedTeam Flex, you can use the upload option to include even more attachments to the Proposal.
Steps:
From the Project Home menu, select Prepare & Submit Proposal
Scroll down to locate the Proposal Attachments section, to include documentation from RedTeam Flex on your Proposal, and click the checkboxes to select the items you want to display.
To upload anything additional attachments to the Proposal, click + Add Attachments.
7. View Proposal
As you put together a Proposal for a Project in the project Setup form, it is important to be able to preview the information you are adding and modifying before the document is sent to the Customer.
When you View a Proposal for a Project in Request status, the document will show a DRAFT watermark, because you are still preparing and have not yet committed the pricing and other details. Once you are ready to submit your Proposal, you will promote the Project to Proposal status to remove the watermark and take a snapshot.
When you View a Proposal for a Project in Proposal status, the document will not show a watermark and will have a time-stamped snapshot included in the History dropdown.
Steps:
From the Project Home menu, select Prepare & Submit Proposal
From the Step 7 of the Project Setup form, click View Proposal.
8. Submit a Proposal
All Project Statuses are updated from the Status Workflow bar. If your role permits, you can click the current status at the top of the page to promote or demote a Project.
When you are done preparing your Proposal and you have previewed it to review all information and pricing, and you are ready to submit the Proposal to your Customer, you will Commit Pricing and promote the Project from Request to Proposal status.
Every time you promote to Proposal status, RedTeam Flex automatically takes a snapshot of the Proposal so that you will always have a history of every Proposal you submitted for this Project.
If you do not have permission to promote Projects, please contact your system administrator or chat with our Support team.
Steps:
Click Request in the status bar (highlighted red) at the top of the page
Click Promote.
9. Send a Proposal to the Customer
When your Proposal to the Customer has been prepared, and reviewed, and the Project has been moved to Proposal status to remove the DRAFT watermark, you are ready to send the Proposal to your Customer. To do this, follow the instructions to View the proposal. In the upper right-hand corner, click Email to email a copy to your Customer, or Print to send the Proposal to print for faxing or mailing. When the signed Proposal is returned, be sure to upload it as a Contract Document.
Steps:
From the Proposal View, click Email or Print
10. View Proposal History
Each time a project is promoted to the Proposal status a version of the current proposal is saved. You can review all previous versions of the proposal by viewing the proposal and following the steps below.
Steps:
Click the drop-down box titled History in the top options of the Proposal view.
You can select all previous versions of the project proposal from the list that is displayed.
