The process of estimating the cost for the development and delivery of a product, service, or solution can range from simple to highly complex based upon multiple factors including: technology maturity, urgency, geographic location, quantity, quality, availability of resources, hardware and software, systems integration and more. This book provides a comprehensive discussion of cost estimating and contract pricing with extensive use of tools, techniques, and best practices from both the public and private sectors. Key topics of discussion include: Cost estimating methods Cost accounting standards Cost analysis Profit analysis Contract pricing arrangements Price analysis Total ownership cost Earned value management systems
This master reference is essential if you contract with the government! Correctly pricing your goods or services—and making certain that those prices are in compliance with myriad federal rules and regulations—is essential to doing business with the government…and ensuring your commercial success. Cost-Based Pricing: A Guide for Government Contractors shows you how to appropriately estimate and price for government contracts and defend those estimates in a government contracting and subcontracting environment. This practical book includes coverage of all government pricing rules and regulations as well as pertinent aspects of related laws, such as the Truth in Negotiations Act. The book walks you through every step of the estimating process. From figuring direct labor costs to intra-company transfers to contract modifications, the coverage is extensive yet accessible for even those new to the process. Using Cost-Based Pricing, you will be able to: • Develop more realistic estimates • Enhance your support of those estimates in negotiations • Avoid violations of the Truth in Negotiations Act • Increase your chances of securing a fair and reasonable price Cost-Based Pricing: A Guide for Government Contractors can make the difference between your success—and profitability—and failure in the federal government arena.
Perform Contracting Successfully! This master reference — in its fifth edition — contains everything you need to know about government pricing rules and regulations in one easy-to-use volume.Guide to Contract Pricing: Cost and Price Analysis for Contractors, Subcontractors, and Government Agencies, Fifth Edition, explains how the government conducts business and walks you through every step of the contracting process. This fully updated edition includes a new chapter on the role of auditors in contract pricing as well as five new detailed appendices. You'll be able to: + Master the steps of the sealed bid process + Improve your skills at evaluating bids, proposals, and quotations + Perfect your ability to analyze direct and indirect labor costs + Improve your chances for securing a fair and reasonable price
How to succeed in the construction business step-by-step guidelines for estimating To be competitive, contractors and homebuilders need to know how to generate complete, accurate estimates for labor and material costs. This book guides readers through the entire estimating process, explaining in detail how to put together a reliable estimate that can be used not only for budgeting, but also for developing a schedule, managing a project, dealing with contingencies, and ultimately making a profit. Completely revised and updated to reflect the new CSI MasterFormat 2010TM system, the Second Edition of this practical guide describes estimating techniques for each building system and how to apply them according to the latest industry standards. Cost considerations and quantity takeoff and pricing are included for virtually every type of work found in residential and light commercial projects, from demolition, concrete, and masonry to windows and doors, siding, roofing, mechanical and electrical systems, finish work, and site construction. Complete with many new graphics and references to professional construction cost databases, the new edition provides experienced contractors and novices alike with essential information on: How to correctly interpret plans and specifications, reflecting updates to contract documents since the first edition Computer estimating techniques and new estimating software for performing quantity takeoff The best methods for conceptual estimating as well as the extremely useful topic of parametric estimating How to allocate the right amounts for profit and contingencies, and other hard-to-find professional guidance How a unit price estimate is built along with labor issues and budgeting for subcontractor work
GAO reviewed defense contractors' estimating systems to determine whether they produced accurate and reliable materiel cost estimates. GAO found that: (1) contractors were not providing Department of Defense (DOD) contracting officers with reliable materiel cost estimates; (2) contracting officers rely extensively on contractor estimates in awarding noncompetitive contracts; (3) current procurement regulations do not require contractors to maintain adequate estimating systems; and (4) the Air Force and the Defense Contract Audit Agency proposed amendments to the Federal Acquisition Regulation that would allow contracting officers to disapprove contractor estimating systems and require them to decrease contract prices in the event of estimation errors.
