One of the most important steps in the E-Rate process is evaluating the bids you receive. The factors you want to consider in your evaluation and the importance of each factor are up to you. You can use as few or as many evaluation factors as you like, and you can assign percentages or points to the factors you use to reflect their relative importance. Note that you must always include the price of the eligible products and services as a factor, and that factor must be weighted more heavily than any other single factor.
For each bid, you can evaluate how well it meets each of the factors and assign a point value or percentage as appropriate. By totaling the scores for each bid, you can arrive at the most cost-effective bid.
Preparing a bid evaluation matrix helps you evaluate bids and also provides documentation of the process you followed to select your service provider.
Below is a sample bid evaluation matrix you can use as a guide.
| FACTOR | POINTS AVAILABLE | VENDOR 1 | VENDOR 2 | VENDOR 3 |
| Price of the eligible products and services | 50* | 20 | 50 | 40 |
| Prior experience with the vendor | 25 | 25 | 0 | 25 |
| Prices for ineligible services and products | 15 | 10 | 5 | 15 |
| Local or in-state vendor | 10 | 10 | 0 | 0 |
| TOTAL | 100 | 65 | 55 | 80 |
*This number must be higher than all other numbers in the same column.List of Disqualified Bidders
- Vendor 4
Reason for disqualification: All interested bidders received two weeks’ notice of a required pre-bid conference. Vendor 4 did not attend this conference and did not provide a reason for their absence.
Important things to note about this sample:
- The price of the eligible products and services must be the most heavily weighted factor. This means that it must have the highest number of “Points Available.” In this sample, the vendors could score up to 50 points for the price of eligible services factor (more than any other single factor).
- The applicant rated the vendors on how well they met each factor. Then, they totaled the vendors’ point values for all factors.
- Vendor 3, with a total of 80 points, is the winning bidder in this sample because they have the highest total number of points.
- The applicant disqualified Vendor 4 and noted the reason for disqualification on the bid evaluation matrix (see the “List of Disqualified Bidders” below the matrix).
For more information on constructing a bid evaluation, visit the USAC website at: