Alternate Bid Prices

When developing a bid form for a public works project that includes an alternate bid, it’s important to be very clear on what you want bidders to actually bid on.

Alternate bids are used differently by different agencies. In its purest sense, an alternate bid should be an alternate material for part of the construction project or an alternate method of construction.

Thus, in asking bidders for a bid price, be clear that you’re asking for the price differential between what is included in the base bid and the alternate bid for the alternate material or method. Otherwise, you may have bidders who include the entire price for performing the work of the alternate. Bidders need to all be bidding on an equal basis, and public agencies need to have a clear way to evaluate bids consistently.

If you ask bidders to bid on the total price for the alternate work (not just the price differential), you won’t have any way to determine how much they actually bid for the material or method in the base bid, unless, of course, you have a unit price bid form that includes these.