Tendering shouldn't need you to become an estimator on top of running your actual jobs. Most contractors don't have a quantity surveyor sitting idle between live contracts, so pricing gets squeezed into evenings, weekends, whatever's left after the day job. That's how shortcuts creep in. Not because anyone's careless, but because there simply isn't time to measure everything the way it deserves.
So here's how the estimating process works when it isn't all falling on you. Three steps, a fixed fee agreed before any of them start, and nothing hidden in the middle.
How the estimating process works before anything is measured
It starts with a short conversation, not a pile of forms. You tell us what the job is, who the client is if that matters, and when your tender's due. We look at what you've got and agree a fixed fee up front, before any measuring starts. No hourly rate running in the background and no surprise invoice when the drawings turn out bigger than they looked. If the scope of what we're pricing changes, we talk about it before doing the extra work, not after.
This is also the point to say what you actually need back. A full priced estimate for a client? A bill of quantities to send out to your own subcontractors? A measured takeoff you'll price yourself? Knowing that up front means the finished document fits how you tender, rather than something you have to rework.
Step one: you send the drawings
You send over whatever you've got: drawings, spec, any schedules that exist. PDF drawings are fine. You don't need to package it up or interpret it first. If it's what you'd hand a quantity surveyor, it's what we need.
Things that help if you have them:
- The full drawing set. Plans, sections, elevations and any details, not just the general arrangement.
- The specification. Even a short one. It decides what goes against each quantity.
- The tender documents. The invitation, any pricing schedule the client wants filled in, and the return date.
- Anything you already know. Access problems, a supplier you always use, a part of the job you're subbing out at a price you already hold.
If something's missing or two drawings disagree, we come back to you before measuring, rather than picking a number and hoping it's close.
Step two: we measure and price it
We measure every element off the drawings to NRM2, groundworks through to finishes and external works, and price it against current UK rates local to the job. Nothing's estimated from a rough multiplier, and nothing's folded into a guess because it was awkward to measure.
Measuring to NRM2 matters for more than tidiness. It means the job is broken down in a recognised order, so anyone reading it (you, the client, the client's QS) can follow how each figure was built. Anything that can't be fully quantified from the information given, like ground conditions or an open spec item, is flagged as its own line rather than buried in a total.
Rates are applied to the measured quantities item by item, not spread across the job as one figure per square metre. So if the client later asks why the external works come to what they do, the answer is right there: the quantity, the rate, and the drawing it came from.
For more on what goes on during the measuring itself, there's a detailed walk-through of what happens after you send your drawings.
You keep the parts of tendering only you can do. We take the part that eats your evenings.
Step three: you bid on your deadline
You get the priced breakdown back through the client portal in time for your submission date, and you tender from a number you can defend rather than one you're hoping holds. No interpreting a rough total. No wondering what's been left out. Just a number built to be checked.
What you do with it is your call. Most contractors go through it, adjust rates where they've got their own supplier or sub prices, set their margin and overheads, and put it into the bid. The measured quantities don't change. The commercial decisions stay yours.
If the client or their QS comes back with questions after you've submitted, the breakdown is what you answer from. Every line has a quantity you can trace back to a drawing, which makes a tender clarification a ten-minute job rather than a scramble to remember how you got to a number.
Why this beats doing it all yourself under deadline
Three steps, and the measuring's off your plate entirely. You're still the one who knows the client, the site and the trades you'll bring in. What you're not doing is scaling drawings at the kitchen table and guessing at rates while the deadline closes in.
It also means you can say yes to more tenders. When pricing a job costs you three evenings, you turn down work you'd have liked to bid. When it costs you an email with the drawings attached, the question becomes which jobs you actually want, not which ones you've got time for.
That's the case for using a construction estimating service rather than hiring someone full time: you get the measuring when the tenders land, and you don't carry the cost when they don't.
A test for whether to hand the next one over
Now you know how the estimating process works from start to finish, the decision is a practical one. Look at your next tender and ask how many hours of measuring sit between you and a price you'd trust. If the honest answer means pricing it tired, or cutting corners on the parts that are awkward to measure, that's the one to send across. The fee's agreed before we start, so you know the cost of the decision before you make it.