As a current member of the MSBO Board of Directors, I have been fortunate to see the inner workings of how MSBO’s staff researches products and services that will add value to MSBO membership. One priority is to ensure that an MSBO-sponsored program helps members save money, time and/or effort when managing day-to-day responsibilities. The products and services may be directed at various district departments - business, facilities, transportation, food service or other support areas in a school. One of the most recent examples is BidSync.
MSBO’s executive team spent many hours reviewing BidSync and its benefits along with inviting in several districts to evaluate this product. Kent Intermediate School District participated in this evaluation. It became clear that BidSync would be very beneficial to all schools by providing the necessary tools to easily and quickly manage the bidding process for any district.
BidSnyc offers maximum flexibility. It is a streamlined, web-based RFP and bidding system that is secure and allows schools to manage all competitive and other procurement processes online.
We used BidSync last year, you may remember, and put out a statewide bid for icemelter. That bid included Wyoming Public Schools and Ingham ISD. We went from our initial collective order of 588 bags to a total of 8,500 bags that included 26 districts. This bid process provided an opportunity for us to learn firsthand how the system works and how easy it was to review bids. While we made some mistakes on the first round, we still saved 10% on our product purchase. Not everyone realized savings, but it was a learning experience on the necessity to provide the most complete information possible on the bid document.
Since November, we have put out bids on office systems furniture and classroom furniture for our new special education building using BidSync. We again realized a savings of 10% on these product purchases. In addition, we have recently received two construction bids for a large playground installation and a rebuild of a parking lot. While we are still evaluating the bids, we are seeing numbers that are 20+% below our estimated cost. We feel our original estimates were fairly accurate for the market conditions. The bottom line is that using BidSync has meant significant savings.
Other benefits of using this system include the time that you save from preparing traditional bids. In the past for our capital outlay purchasing, we would send out over 200 invitations to bid. That is 200 letters and envelopes that had to be addressed, stuffed and mailed – consider the labor hours demanded by processing bids the “old” way. This is another example of saving time and money. Other benefits realized with BidSync include:
- Simple bid creation - simply fill in the electronic form and BidSync creates a bid packet.
- Automatic communication of notifications and addendums sent to vendors - Q&A’s are posted directly to the bid. (This reduces time spent on answering the same questions.) Responses can also be sent directly to a vendor if they choose. BidSync will contact your preferred vendor to be sure they respond to your bid. They also monitor bids and actively seek vendors if there appears to be low interest. Districts can quickly see which vendors have reviewed the bid.
- Easy online bid review - bid tabulation packets are generated quickly and available in different formats. Bid tabulation can be exported into Excel including any notes from the bid tab. The program can also be set up to notify vendors of award.
I think you will agree that this is another great example of MSBO seeking out and providing valuable solutions that save time, effort and money.
If you have not registered for MSBO’s Annual Conference in Detroit, don’t miss out, and register today! More than 200 sessions are scheduled. There is something for everyone. I hope to see you there.