Bid package
A bid package is the bundle of scope issued to subcontractors as a single unit for pricing, usually corresponding to one trade.
Also written as bid packages, trade package, work package.
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Reviewed by Eric Collin · President and Founder of Firmo Construction, 20+ years in preconstruction and bid evaluation
A project is split into packages so that each one can be bid by contractors who actually do that work. The split often follows CSI MasterFormat divisions, though it is a commercial decision as much as a technical one — packages get combined or divided based on how the local subcontractor market is organized.
Where the packages meet is where the risk sits. Every boundary between two packages is a place where each side can reasonably assume the other is carrying an item, and those boundaries are the origin of most scope gaps. A project split into more packages has more seams and needs more careful leveling, not less.
Each package is bid, leveled, and awarded on its own, which is why the unit of work in comparison is the package rather than the project.
- Scope of work
A scope of work is the written definition of what a package or contract covers — the work a bidder is being asked to price.
- CSI MasterFormat
CSI MasterFormat is the standard numbering system that organizes construction specifications into numbered divisions and sections.
- Scope gap
A scope gap is work required by the project that no bidder included in its price, because every bidder assumed someone else was carrying it.
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