Free templates / Construction

Bid Leveling Template (Excel)

A free Excel spreadsheet to level up to four subcontractor bids on one scope package: list the scope, mark what each bidder included, give excluded items a plug value, and compare the leveled totals.

Download the Excel template

Free, no sign-up. Opens in Excel, Google Sheets and LibreOffice.

Mirage does this work from your own documents. See AI bid leveling

Who uses it, and when

Project managers and estimators at general contractors use it on bid day, when three or four subcontractor quotes for the same package arrive in different formats, with different exclusions, and the team has to decide which one to carry in its own bid.

Construction managers and owner's representatives use the same sheet after award, to document why a bidder was selected: a leveled comparison is the record procurement and auditors ask for on publicly funded work.

What is in the file

Leveling: The package block, the scope items with their specification section, quantity and your plug value, then two columns per bidder: a status for each item (included, excluded, not priced, clarify or extra scope) and the adjustment it causes. Under them: base bid, adjustments, deducts, leveled bid, rank, difference to the lowest, items to clarify, bond, schedule and notes.
Instructions: How to fill it, step by step.

Column by column

Scope item: One line per element of the package scope, written from the drawings and the specification sections of the package, not from any bidder's letter. The scope is yours; the bids are measured against it.
Spec section, quantity, unit: Where the item is specified and how much of it there is. They let you check a bidder's unit price against the quantity it should cover.
Plug value: What you would carry for the item if a bidder left it out: your own estimate for it, or the price another bidder gave for the same item. It is an assumption, so note where it comes from.
Bidder status: For each bidder and each item: Included, Excluded, Not priced, Clarify or Extra scope. Read the bid letter's inclusions and exclusions paragraph by paragraph to set it.
Bidder adjustment: Computed: the plug value when the item is excluded or not priced, zero otherwise.
Base bid as submitted: The number on the bidder's letter, before any adjustment.
Deducts for extra scope: Entered by hand when a bidder priced something you did not ask for and you can value it from the bid.
Leveled bid, rank, difference: Base bid plus adjustments minus deducts; the rank among bidders; the gap to the lowest leveled bid.
Items to clarify, bond, schedule, notes: A count of open questions per bidder, whether the bond is included, the duration offered, and the qualifications that do not fit in a number.

How to use it

Write the package's scope in column A, one item per line, from the drawings and specifications.
Give each item a plug value: what you would carry for it if a bidder left it out.
Enter each bidder's name and base bid as submitted.
Mark every scope item for every bidder: included, excluded, not priced, clarify or extra scope.
Read the leveled bids, their rank and the difference to the lowest; resolve the items marked clarify before award.

Limits

A plug value is an assumption: the leveled total is only as good as your plug values.
Deducts for extra scope are entered by hand: the sheet cannot know what an item the bidder added is worth to you.
Leveling makes bids comparable. The award still weighs qualifications, schedule, bonding and the bidder's record, which the sheet only records.

A worked example

A drywall package with four scope items and three bidders. Bidder A, 400,000, includes everything. Bidder B, 385,000, excludes demolition (plug 12,000) and hoisting (plug 8,500) and does not include its bond. Bidder C, 410,000, includes everything but marks fire caulking as 'by others', which you set to Clarify.

Leveled: A 400,000; B 405,500 before the bond, so A is lowest by 5,500 although B was lowest on paper. C stays at 410,000 with one item to clarify. If C confirms fire caulking is included, A still wins; if not, C moves further away.

Mistakes to avoid

Building the scope list from the lowest bidder's letter: whatever it left out disappears from the comparison.
Using a plug value that is too low because it came from the bidder who excluded the item. Take it from your estimate or from a bidder who priced it.
Treating 'not mentioned' as included. Silence is a Clarify, and it should be asked before award, in writing.
Comparing a bid with bond and tax to one without them. Note both and add what is missing.
Awarding with open Clarify items. The scope letter in the subcontract should settle every one of them.

Questions

What is bid leveling?

Comparing subcontractor bids for the same scope line by line, so that missing scope, exclusions and extras are accounted for before the bids are compared. Without it, the lowest number on paper is often the bid that left the most out.

What is a plug value?

An amount the general contractor carries for an item a bidder excluded or did not price, usually from its own estimate or from another bidder's price for the same item. Adding it to that bid puts all bids on the same scope.

How is bid leveling different from a bid tabulation?

A bid tabulation lists the bids as submitted, often published by a public owner after a bid opening. Leveling adjusts each bid to the same scope before comparing them, which is what a general contractor does before awarding a subcontract.

Can I compare more than four bidders?

Yes: copy a bidder's two columns and its block of totals, then extend the rank and difference formulas to include the new bidder.

Should the lowest leveled bid win?

Not automatically. The leveled total tells you the price for the same scope; qualifications, schedule, bonding, safety record and past performance still decide the award.

How long should bid leveling take?

For a single package with three or four bids, an experienced estimator usually needs from under an hour to half a day, most of it reading the bid letters rather than doing arithmetic. The time grows with the number of exclusions and unclear items, which is why a scope list prepared before bids arrive is the biggest saving: the leveling then becomes a matter of marking statuses rather than discovering scope.

What is the difference between an exclusion and a qualification?

An exclusion removes an item from the price; a qualification sets a condition on it, such as a working-hours restriction, an escalation clause or a validity period. Both change what the bid is worth, but only exclusions get a plug value; qualifications go in the notes and are weighed at award.

Bids read and leveled for you

This sheet levels the bids you type in. Mirage deploys AI agents that read subcontractor quotations in the format they arrive in, map every line to your scope and flag exclusions and gaps, for your estimators to review before award.

Book a call See AI bid leveling