Searching the RFP yourself works best when you know the exact word the agency used. Asking AI works when you already know what you want to find out, but not where the agency put it or what they called it. When you’re deciding whether a bid is worth going after, many of your questions are the second kind. So ask first, then confirm the answer in the document before you decide.
Say you own a concrete company. It’s Thursday afternoon, a city just posted a sidewalk and curb repair bid, and you want to know by tomorrow whether it’s worth going after. You first write down the questions: “Is there a job walk, and when?” “Does the city give local businesses a preference?” Then you notice the project uses federal transportation funds and wonder whether there’s a DBE goal you’d have to meet. Every answer lives somewhere in a long document and its attachments, and every trip to find one eats into time you could spend on bids you already know you want.
It isn’t that the agency is trying to hide anything. The documents just aren’t usually organized around the questions you have when you’re deciding whether to bid.
A typical solicitation splits into instructions to bidders, a scope of work, special conditions, a sample agreement, and attachments like site lists and maps, though the names vary from agency to agency. On top of that, agencies can have a vocabulary of their own that you don’t have time to learn and remember. You might search for “walkthrough” to see if you need to visit the site, but the RFP calls it a “job walk.” A keyword search only works if you guess the agency’s correct word. Guess wrong, and it looks like the answer isn’t there at all.
They operate in different ways, which is exactly why it helps to use both.
It depends on how often you bid and how familiar the documents are to you. If you bid a few times a year with agencies you already know, searching yourself is likely enough. You’ve learned how they write, and a keyword search usually lands where you expect.
Asking AI is worth it when you’re sizing up several opportunities at once, bidding with agencies you haven’t worked with before, or moving into a new line of work where the terms are unfamiliar. General AI assistants can answer questions about a document you upload, though you’ll be downloading and uploading each file yourself. AI built into a bid platform skips that step for the bids the platform covers.
They tend to fall into a handful of groups, and keeping a running list like the one we made below saves you from asking the same things twice:
Run each new opportunity through this list. If an answer is a clear no, you can pass early. If everything checks out, then the solicitation is worth a full read.
Treat AI like a coworker who has read the bid from front to back. It gets you an answer fast, and you still check the document yourself before moving forward.
That’s how AI Chat in VendorLine’s Smart Bid Assistant feature fits into a bid decision. You ask any bid-specific question about scope, timelines, compliance, or requirements and get a plain-language answer in seconds, without downloading the project file. Then you check the details in the bid documents and decide whether to submit a bid.
Before you open your next solicitation, start a question list from the groups above and run each new opportunity through it. If you’d rather ask those questions than search for them manually, VendorLine Pro Plus AI includes AI Chat on solicitations from PlanetBids agencies.
It’s a rule some agencies use to give local businesses an edge when bids are evaluated. Some cities set it as a small percentage above the low bid for businesses located within city limits. Each agency sets its own rules, so check the solicitation and the agency’s purchasing page.
It’s a minimum pay rate set for specific types of workers on certain public projects. Whether it applies, and at what rates, depends on the project and how it’s funded. The solicitation will say.
On some federally funded transportation projects, the agency sets a goal for how much of the work goes to certified Disadvantaged Business Enterprises. If a bid has a DBE goal, the solicitation explains what bidders need to show to meet it.
It's set in each solicitation, usually in its timeline or schedule of events, and it often falls days or weeks before the bid is due. Questions sent after it may not be answered.
No. It answers specific questions quickly, but you should still read the sections that affect your decision and confirm any answer against the bid documents.