The Bid Express Small Business Network® (SBN) service is designed to enhance the communication process between small businesses - most notably DBEs - and the prime contracting community.
Using the SBN, prime and subcontractors can:
- Create and respond to sub-quote requests
- Create and respond to unsolicited sub-quotes
- Communicate about upcoming work
- Ensure DBE goals are met
All of these actions can be found on the SBN tab under different views, SBN Prime Contractor View and SBN Subcontractor View Prime. Any contractor account can switch between them at any time. From the SBN tab, click on the SBN for Sub/Prime Contractors link at the top of the page to access the alternate view and functions.
Expand the following topics to learn more.
Prime contractors
When acting as a prime, you can create sub-quote requests to which your subcontractors or DBEs can then respond.
Sub-quote requests allow primes to actively seek subcontractors to work with on a particular proposal. Once published, a sub-quote request is publicly displayed as part of the subcontractor view and saved to the My Sub-quote Requests panel of your prime contractor view.
Subcontractors who have selected the work types in your request will receive an email that a request has been published.
Create a new sub-quote request
SBN tab > Prime Contractor View
- From the My Sub-quote Requests panel, click Create New.
- Enter or verify the required information in the Header Information fields. Click Save And Continue.
- Find the relevant letting and click Select This Letting to view its proposals.
- Find the relevant proposal and click Select This Proposal to apply the sub-quote request.
- Select the work types and items to include in the sub-quote request plus any item comments or changes in quantity. Click Save And Continue.
- Enter any terms and conditions for the request. Click Save And Continue.
- Verify your request and click Publish. If needed, you can click Save Draft to continue working later.
Edit or withdraw a sub-quote request
If you saved a request as a draft, you can edit it by finding the request in the My Sub-quote requests panel and clicking Edit.
If a published request needs to be edited, find it and click Withdraw.
Once you've made your edits and are ready to make the request public, click Publish.
The My Sub-quote Requests panel is where you can view the requests you've sent out, their number of reads and responses, and generate reporting.
Reporting is a convenient feature that helps primes provide proof of their DBE outreach efforts to the agencies they bid with. The Bid Express SBN will generate an outreach report for each request.
Generate outreach reporting on a sub-quote request
SBN tab > Prime Contractor View
- Select a published sub-quote number from the My Sub-quote Requests panel to view its details.
- Click View Outreach report.
- Click Download PDF to generate a PDF for print or digital storage.
Once a subcontractor replies to your sub-quote request, a notification indicator will appear under your sub-quote. Click the 1 Read, 1 Reply link.
Review the reply details and click Respond to open the response message modal.
In the Reply field, enter a message to the subcontractor. Click Send.
Subcontractors can select vendors to notify of unsolicitated sub-quotes they create. If you are selected, any unsolicited sub-quotes will appear in the Unsolicited Sub-quotes panel.
To respond to an unsolicited sub-quote, find it in this panel and click Respond. In the Reply field, enter a message to the subcontractor. Click Send.
Subcontractors
When acting as a subcontractor or DBE, you can respond to prime contractors' sub-quote requests and create unsolicited sub-quote requests to send to prime contractors.
SBN tab > Subcontractor View
- From the Sub-quote Requests panel, find the request and click Reply.
- Enter all the information requested and click Save and Continue.
- Select the items to include in your quote. Items can be selected from the items requested by the Prime or from the additional items that are part of the proposal.
- Enter the quantities and prices of the items. Click Save And Continue.
- Enter any terms or conditions of the response and click Save And Continue.
- Upload any attachments for the response by clicking Upload/Manage Attachments.
- Click Browse and select the file. Click Upload > Done > Save and Continue.
- Review and verify your response. When you're ready to send the reply to the prime, click Notify.
SBN tab > Subcontractor View
- From the Unsolicited Sub-quotes panel, click Create New.
- Enter or verify the required information in the Header Information fields.
- Enter an expiration date, what work types the quote includes, and any other comments. Click Save And Continue.
- Find the relevant letting and click Select This Letting to view its proposals.
- Find the relevant proposal and click Select This Proposal to associate your sub-quote to it.
- Click Add Work Types to select the relevant work type(s). Click Add Selected.
- Click Add Items to select the relevant items from a list of items given in the proposal. Click Add Selected.
- For each item, enter a price. Add comments or update sub-quote quantity if needed. Click Save and Continue.
- Enter any terms and conditions for the sub-quote. Click Save and Continue.
- Upload any attachments for the sub-quote by clicking Upload/Manage Attachments.
- Click Browse and select the file. Click Upload > Done > Save and Continue.
- Review and verify your sub-quote. When you're ready to send it to primes, click Choose Vendors.
- Select all of the vendors you want to send the sub-quote to. Click Add Selected.
- When you're ready, click Notify Vendors. Your unsolicited sub-quote will be sent to each of the selected vendors' Unsolicited Sub-quotes inbox.
From your Unsolicited Sub-quotes panel, find the request and click View Prime Response.
You'll see a table of responses received for this sub-quote. Click View Response next to a prime contractor's name.