Government Contract Proposal Writing Software

Final Word: The Best Proposal Software In 2021

The best proposal writing software of your choice will likely depend on your companys specific needs.

So, if youre a small business looking to just streamline the sales process with a simple CPQ tool, you might not be excited by spending hundreds of dollars on sales proposal software.

On the other hand, project managers at large enterprises will be looking for complex solutions with CRM integrations, mobile apps, and many advanced features.

Whatever you choose, make sure to compare all the pricing plans and features. Youll want to know exactly what youre paying for!

If youre looking for that perfect combination of convenience, features, and affordability we suggest you take a look at PandaDoc.

Our template library will give you everything youre looking for plus youll enjoy navigating through our intuitive interface.

for a free trial of PandaDoc and try it out!

Originally published October 4, 2019, updated June 29, 2021

Review Quickly And Confidently

Get real-time access to approvals, comments and version tracking. Smart features like variables and conditional logic help you eliminate document errors.

Get real-time access to approvals, comments and version tracking. Smart features like variables and conditional logic help you eliminate document errors.

Matt Nyman Client Success Manager at HPC CPA

Work With Your Existing Documents And Software

With PandaDoc custom integrations and just a few clicks, you can import contact details, proposal templates, company and client information, and more. It takes only minutes to create custom proposals, and an array of collaboration tools make it easy to communicate with your team and approve documents before they are sent.

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Filling Out Standard Form 33 To Create A Binding Government Contract

Standard Form 33: Solicitation, Offer and Award is the form that is used to solicit offers and award contracts. It is referred to as a bi-lateral or two-signature document. You sign the form in Block 17, and the government signs the same form in Block 27. That establishes a binding contract.

Tools to use

Among the Tools & Forms are Standard Form 26. It is an Adobe PDF file.

Before you start going through our line-by-line explanation, this may be a good time to peruse reviewing the bid, and go over how to read a contract and the general layout of the SF 33. The top portion, Blocks 1-11, is the Solicitation area and is filled in by the government with information about the solicitation. Blocks 12-18, the Offer area, are filled in by you before returning the offer to the buying office. The last portion, Blocks 19-28, is the Award area and is completed by the government and sent back to you, if and when you are awarded the contract.

Work smart

Note the paging format “Page 1 of ##.” Check your page numbers and if there are any missing, call the buying office immediately. You can’t submit an accurate bid if there is information missing. More than one company has been caught in this situation. When sending out millions of bids a year, as the government does, these things can happen.

Reviews For Fast Track Proposal Writer

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Technology And Feature List

The feature richness of the PMS needs to be assessed to determine whether it meets all requirements of the business. For example, how robust is the workflow management system and whether it meets the requirements? If not, does it provide customization ability to fit into organization needs? If the organization already has an existing e-signature, does PMS provide integration? If not, it would be good to have built-in e-signature capabilities. The software should provide pre-built templates that meet the requirements of the business and the industry vertical.

Filling Out Dd Form 1707

The first form that we will look at is DD Form 1707, Information to Offerors or Quoters. This is the cover sheet that accompanies the solicitation itself and is mainly informational. One of its main purposes is to gather information on why a company does not want to bid. This form is used for most Department of Defense large dollar solicitations, which are those over $100,000.

Let’s start with the cover page and proceed block by block.

Block 1: Solicitation number: We are using the example number SP0700-00-Q-HE22. This is the number that will identify this specific solicitation throughout the life of the buying action. Any amendments to the solicitation will use this number plus the amendment number as the identifier.

SP0700, the first six alpha/numeric sequence, identifies the buying office where the order originates. The second grouping, 00, is the fiscal year the solicitation was issued. The single alpha character Q indicates what type of solicitation it is.

• B = Invitation for Bid

The last alpha/numeric sequence, HE22, is the sequential order number for that solicitation.

Block 2: Type of solicitation: As previously mentioned, there are three types of bid packages:

Tools to use

Among the Tools & Forms are DD Form 1707 and Standard Form 26. It is an Adobe PDF file.

Block 3: Date/time response due: This information, supplied by the buying office, tells you when you need to have your offer into the buying office.

Warning

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Handling Proposals And Information

Upon receipt at the location specified in the solicitation, proposals and information received in response to a request for information shall be marked with the date and time of receipt and shall be transmitted to the designated officials.

Proposals shall be safeguarded from unauthorized disclosure throughout the source selection process. . Information received in response to an RFI shall be safeguarded adequately from unauthorized disclosure.

If any portion of a proposal received by the contracting officer electronically or by facsimile is unreadable, the contracting officer immediately shall notify the offeror and permit the offeror to resubmit the unreadable portion of the proposal. The method and time for resubmission shall be prescribed by the contracting officer after consultation with the offeror, and documented in the file. The resubmission shall be considered as if it were received at the date and time of the original unreadable submission for the purpose of determining timeliness under 15.208, provided the offeror complies with the time and format requirements for resubmission prescribed by the contracting officer.

Collaborate In A Time

Our proposal creation tool enables fast and effective collaboration. You can create automated approval rules, notifying yourself and relevant parties when a document is ready to be sent, or a signature is required. Instant communication is made possible by in-document messaging features that are even available when editing a document. Furthermore, you can create separate workspaces with relevant permissions for different teams and projects.

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Securely Store Esignatures And Important Documents

Adding eSignature options to government proposals and approvals is a simple motion of dragging-and-dropping the appropriate fields in the document editor. Youll automatically be alerted whenever an eSignature is required from management, or when a recipient signs off. All signatures are kept securely in our cloud storage, which is compliant in over 42 countries.

Contract Management Vs Proposal Management

It is worthwhile to differentiate the contract management software and PMS in that the former provides features like creation and management of contracts, service level agreements and procurement agreements that are legally enforceable whereas the latter facilitates the creation of a documented offering of products and services. A proposal would eventually lead to a contract. The other perspective is the CPQ software that is typically used in B2B scenarios that enable sellers to configure, quote and price specific goods only.

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Ofac Search For Vendor & Employee Compliance

A government contract management software platform that integrates seamlessly with OFAC search data for risk mitigation and compliance management permits government organizations to run checks on vendor and employee data against data in OFACs national sanctions lists.

You can schedule OFAC search scans and integrate them into vendor and employee record pages to establish centralized vendor, company, and employee risk analysis and risk mitigation. Such oversight can allow you to control whether to include OFAC searches with Also Known As items to check for possible aliases for vendors, organizations, and employees within OFACs database. Additionally, you can configure what percentage of data the tool flags as a match between OFAC search data and vendor, company, and employee data.

OFAC Search integration benefits also include user-friendly search details and visually engaging graphs that map the data match percentage.

CobbleStone Software provides OFAC Search integration as an optional, add-on license. See risk analysis details at a glance with advanced government contract management software integrated with OFAC search!

Special Cost Or Pricing Areas

15.407-1 Defective certified cost or pricing data.

If, before agreement on price, the contracting officer learns that any certified cost or pricing data submitted are inaccurate, incomplete, or noncurrent, the contracting officer shall immediately bring the matter to the attention of the prospective contractor, whether the defective data increase or decrease the contract price. The contracting officer shall consider any new data submitted to correct the deficiency, or consider the inaccuracy, incompleteness, or noncurrency of the data when negotiating the contract price. The price negotiation memorandum shall reflect the adjustments made to the data or the corrected data used to negotiate the contract price.

In arriving at a price adjustment, the contracting officer shall consider the time by which the certified cost or pricing data became reasonably available to the contractor, and the extent to which the Government relied upon the defective data.

The clauses referred to in paragraph of this subsection recognize that the Governments right to a price adjustment is not affected by any of the following circumstances:

The contractor or subcontractor was a sole source supplier or otherwise was in a superior bargaining position

The contract was based on an agreement about the total cost of the contract and there was no agreement about the cost of each item procured under such contract or

An offset shall not be allowed if-

Consider the date of each overpayment and

General.

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Solicitation Provisions And Contract Clauses

Changes or Additions to Make-or-Buy Program. The contracting officer shall insert the clause at 52.215-9, Changes or Additions to Make-or-Buy Program, in solicitations and contracts when it is contemplated that a make-or-buy program will be incorporated in the contract. If a less economical “make” or “buy” categorization is selected for one or more items of significant value, the contracting officer shall use the clause with-

Its Alternate I, if a fixed-price incentive contract is contemplated or

Its Alternate II, if a cost-plus-incentive-fee contract is contemplated.

Price Reduction for Defective Certified Cost or Pricing Data. The contracting officer shall, when contracting by negotiation, insert the clause at 52.215-10, Price Reduction for Defective Certified Cost or Pricing Data, in solicitations and contracts when it is contemplated that certified cost or pricing data will be required from the contractor or any subcontractor .

Price Reduction for Defective Certified Cost or Pricing Data-Modifications. The contracting officer shall, when contracting by negotiation, insert the clause at 52.215-11, Price Reduction for Defective Certified Cost or Pricing DataModifications, in solicitations and contracts when it is contemplated that certified cost or pricing data will be required from the contractor or any subcontractor for the pricing of contract modifications, and the clause prescribed in paragraph of this section has not been included.

Integrity of Unit Prices.

Which Industries Use Pms

Since the aim is to win the business from a potential customer, some of the important industries where the software is widely used are listed below.

Construction

PMS can be used in the construction industry for commercial or residential projects, leasing or renting construction equipment, maintenance of the property and so on.

Hospitality & Event Management

For winning the business in the hospitality and event management sector, PMS will be suitable, for instance, when RFPs for country or global level events need to be responded to, proposal management software helps to create professional proposals.

Healthcare

There is an increasing demand for healthcare services world over and growth in related systems, equipment, and manpower.

Manufacturing

The complexity of the manufacturing industries makes them an ideal candidate for the adoption of PMS.

Services

Bidding for an RFP for any services project could necessitate the use of PMS. Some examples include IT services, auditing services, investment services and so on.

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Obtaining Certified Cost Or Pricing Data

15.403-1 Prohibition on obtaining certified cost or pricing data .

Certified cost or pricing data shall not be obtained for acquisitions at or below the simplified acquisition threshold.

Exceptions to certified cost or pricing data requirements. The contracting officer shall not require certified cost or pricing data to support any action

When the contracting officer determines that prices agreed upon are based on adequate price competition of this subsection)

When the contracting officer determines that prices agreed upon are based on prices set by law or regulation of this subsection)

When a commercial product or commercial service is being acquired of this subsection)

When a waiver has been granted of this subsection) or

When modifying a contract or subcontract for commercial products or commercial services of this section).

Standards for exceptions from certified cost or pricing data requirements

Adequate price competition.

A price is based on adequate price competition when

Two or more responsible offerors, competing independently, submit priced offers that satisfy the Governments expressed requirement

Award will be made to the offeror whose proposal represents the best value where price is a substantial factor in source selection and

For agencies other than DoD, NASA, and the Coast Guard, a price is also based on adequate price competition when

The offeror believed that at least one other offeror was capable of submitting a meaningful offer and

Exchanges With Offerors After Receipt Of Proposals

Clarifications and award without discussions.

Clarifications are limited exchanges, between the Government and offerors, that may occur when award without discussions is contemplated.

If award will be made without conducting discussions, offerors may be given the opportunity to clarify certain aspects of proposals or to resolve minor or clerical errors.

Award may be made without discussions if the solicitation states that the Government intends to evaluate proposals and make award without discussions. If the solicitation contains such a notice and the Government determines it is necessary to conduct discussions, the rationale for doing so shall be documented in the contract file and 41 U.S.C. 3703).

Communications with offerors before establishment of the competitive range. Communications are exchanges, between the Government and offerors, after receipt of proposals, leading to establishment of the competitive range. If a competitive range is to be established, these communications-

Shall be limited to the offerors described in paragraphs and of this section and-

Shall be held with offerors whose past performance information is the determining factor preventing them from being placed within the competitive range. Such communications shall address adverse past performance information to which an offeror has not had a prior opportunity to respond and

Ambiguities in the proposal or other concerns ) and

Information relating to relevant past performance and

Competitive range.

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The Future Of Government Contracting

The sheer scale and size of the US government make it challenging for government contractors to win business. A prominent defense contractor may spend months and months preparing a response to an RFP only to be thrown out of compliance for a misplaced acronym. In the age of technology and automation, there had to be a better way to do business. The gains in Artificial Intelligence have changes the possibilities in government contracting. Software such as the CAP leverages automation of business processes and unstructured data to transform businesses. For government contracting and across industries, Scion Analytics supports teams that want to imagine what they can do with the CAP. Scion Analytics encourages businesses to explore the art of the possible.

For government contracting, time that was spent on the RFP process now becomes available for innovation. The commitment to innovation encourages new bright sparks of ideas and moves humans forward. At Scion Analytics, we started with small changes that lead to big advancements in the world.

Increasing Your Revenue Through Government Sales

We simplify the government sales process for you, customizing it to accommodate your structure and your comfort level. Our clients span across the United States and work in sectors from engineering and construction to print and design.

“Through JetCo’s capture services, our company has been introduced to numerous government opportunities. JetCo’s assistance in breaking into the government contracting sector has lead to the development of valuable and necessary bid assets and contract wins over $3 million in the past year.” – President, JetCo Client

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Meet Compliance Standards Exceed Expectations

Government contractors need to perform to the expectations outlined in their government contract, and they must do so while remaining in regulatory compliance with any legislation enacted by state and federal government agencies. Each of these challenges is tough enough to meet on its own, so finding the right government contract management software typically helps generate a significant boost in operational efficiency.