Public bid costs to price separately include retainage financing, inspector training, and CPM scheduling time, subject to the rules governing your project.
Key takeaways
- Track retained funds and bond acceptance dates in your cash-flow model.
- Check each inspector's training and certification before pricing additional training.
- Check the CPM schedule bid item before estimating scheduling hours.
Each line on the bid schedule carries a quantity and a unit, such as cubic yards, linear feet, tons, or each, and the rate multiplies the quantity into a price. That structure is useful, but it has a blind spot. Some costs on public work do not follow the quantity of any item on the schedule. They come from the rules a public owner attaches to the job: how money is held back, who must be trained to inspect site controls, and how the schedule is managed and reported.
Those costs are easy to miss because they do not look like construction. Retainage shows up as a cash-flow problem months after the bid. Inspector training shows up as a staffing question when a permit starts. A scheduling requirement shows up as meeting hours that nobody priced. If you price these by feel inside your unit rates, you can win the job and still lose margin on work the bid schedule never named.
This post covers three of them, using official pages on each topic: how retained funds and bond premiums are handled under Washington's statute, how inspector training is handled under EPA's 2022 Construction General Permit, and how CPM scheduling levels are set on Caltrans contracts. Each rule belongs to the agency or program named with it. A rule from one state, agency, or permit does not carry over to another project, so read the governing document for each job before you carry any of these numbers into a bid.
The rest of this post takes each cost in turn. For each one, it gives the rule, the number or date the source states, and the steps for putting the cost into your estimate.
Retainage ties up cash until the bond is accepted
Under Washington's rule, the public body must release the bonded portion of the retained funds to the contractor within thirty days of accepting the bond from the contractor. The statute is RCW 60.28.011, and that thirty-day date is the one to put on your cash-flow schedule.
Retained money is money you have earned but cannot yet spend. For estimating, the question is not whether the money comes but when it comes and what it costs you to wait. Those are two different numbers, and neither one is in your unit rates. The unit rate tells you what the work is worth. It does not tell you how long your cash will sit with the owner.
The same section also describes deposits made by the public body. Subsection (b) covers funds "deposited by the public body in an interest bearing account in a bank, mutual savings bank, or savings and loan association." Subsection (c) covers funds "placed in escrow with a bank or trust company by the public body." Ask the owner which method applies and get the answer in writing before you finalize your financing assumptions.
To price the wait, multiply the held balance by your daily financing rate and the number of days held; divide an annual rate by its applicable day-count basis first. Get your financing rate and carrying cost from your own books. Use the statute's release period as the end point. The thirty days run from the date the bond is accepted, so record that date. If acceptance happens later, the release moves with it, and you will need that record if the money arrives late.
A simple check is to write the cost as one sentence: held balance times daily financing rate times days held. Run it twice, once with the owner's expected release date and once with a later date, so you can see what a delay would cost before you submit.
Subcontractors and suppliers add a second clock. Under the same Washington section, the contractor must release funds retained from a subcontractor or supplier to that subcontractor or supplier within thirty days of accepting the bond from them. If you are the prime, the owner's release date and your subcontractors' release dates are two separate clocks, so both belong in the same cash-flow model.
If you are a subcontractor or supplier, check the premium line. Under the same section, the contractor may withhold the subcontractor's portion of the bond premium. That means the number you submit may not be the number you collect. Ask the prime how the premium will be handled before you commit to a price, and write the answer into your quote or subcontract. For related bid preparation, use the construction bonding checklist.
The practical steps are short. Put retainage on its own line in the cash-flow model, not inside the unit rates. Carry the owner's release and the subcontractor's release as separate dates. Note the bond acceptance date for each release. State in your proposal how bond premiums are treated. None of these changes the price of a unit of work, which is why they are easy to lose in a bid. They change when you get paid and what the wait costs you.
Inspector training is a staffing cost you have to schedule
Under EPA's 2022 Construction General Permit, training for personnel who conduct Part 4 inspections was updated, so the training of those inspectors is a staffing cost you have to plan for. The EPA's Construction General Permit inspector training page states: "For the 2022 CGP, EPA has updated the training requirements for personnel conducting inspections required under Part 4 of the permit." If you assign crew to those inspections, the training question belongs in the estimate, not in the field.
There are two training routes, with EPA modules available to fill missing topics in a non-EPA course. The first route is the EPA course. The page says that if an individual completes the EPA course and passes the exam, "that person will be considered qualified to conduct inspections under Part 4 of the 2022 CGP," and will be provided with documentation showing successful completion. The cost here is the individual's time in the course and on the exam.
The second route is a non-EPA course. The page says that if the non-EPA course "covers the minimum topics listed in Part 6.3.b of the CGP, an individual completing the course and having an up-to-date certification of completion can rely on the course to comply with the CGP's requirements." The cost here is the course itself, plus keeping the certification current. The course has to be checked against the minimum topic list before you rely on it.
Supplementation fills gaps in the non-EPA route rather than qualifying an inspector on its own. The page notes that if one of the minimum topics from the Part 6.3.b list is not covered by a non-EPA program, such as installation and maintenance of pollution prevention practices, "you may consider supplementing that training program with the analogous module of the EPA course." The page's example is Module 4. The word "may" matters. The guidance describes this as something to consider, not a required step.
For pricing, separate three things: the EPA course time for the people who need it, the cost of a non-EPA course and the certification that keeps it valid, and the cost of any supplemental module for a missing topic. Get fees and hours from your own training quotes and from the time your crew will spend.
Put the same choices in your own file as well. Name each inspector, the route they use, the date they completed it, and the date their certification should be checked. A short roster like that takes little time to make and saves a search when the permit inspections begin.
Two habits keep this cost from surprising you. First, check your existing inspectors' records before you add a training line. Someone on your team may already hold a qualifying completion under one of these routes. Second, put certification dates in the job file and track them through the project. The non-EPA route depends on an up-to-date certification of completion, so a lapsed date is a gap you need to catch early.
Staffing choices are also pricing choices. If you use an inspector who already has the training, the cost is that person's hours on the inspections. If you train someone new, the cost is the course, the time away from other work, and the risk that the trainee is not ready when the inspections begin. Price the option you actually plan to use, and say in your proposal that inspection staffing is part of your price.
CPM scheduling levels add staff time that unit rates do not carry
On Caltrans contracts, a contract without a CPM schedule bid item requires level 1 CPM scheduling, while one that contains a CPM schedule bid item requires level 2. The Caltrans construction manual, Chapter 3, Section 8: Prosecution and Progress states this rule, and the same section sets out the level 2 requirements.
Look at the bid schedule first. Whether a CPM schedule bid item is present is the line the Caltrans page ties the level to, so that is the line to check before you price any scheduling work. Do not guess the level from the size of the project or the type of work. Read the bid items.
Level 2 is where scheduling becomes a staffing line. The page says that "Level 2 CPM schedule requirements include a preconstruction scheduling conference shortly after contract approval." That conference takes people's time soon after approval. Price the attendees' hours and the preparation, not just the meeting itself.
The same page says that "Level 2 CPM scheduling requires weekly meetings to resolve scheduling issues until the baseline schedule is accepted." These are recurring hours. Estimate them as meeting length times the number of attendees times the number of weeks until acceptance. Your estimate has to carry an assumption about how long the baseline takes to accept. State that assumption openly so the owner can see it.
Because the meetings run until the baseline schedule is accepted, the number of meetings depends on when that acceptance happens. Put a weekly checkpoint in your plan that reviews the baseline's status, so the meeting count stays tied to the real acceptance date.
Who attends matters for cost. A scheduler who maintains the baseline, a project manager who answers for the schedule, and a field lead who can speak for the work each carry a different hourly cost. Decide who attends each meeting and price those people at their own rates, rather than rolling everything into a general overhead figure. That keeps the line honest when someone asks why the scheduling number changed.
Level 1 needs its own check. Read the contract's specifications for what level 1 requires of you, and price it on that basis. Do not assume level 1 is free of cost.
The timing of scheduling work also affects your estimate. Because the level 2 conference comes soon after contract approval, the early scheduling hours land at the start of the job. Put those hours in your cost plan at the point where they occur, not spread evenly across the project. A flat monthly figure would hide the front-loaded hours.
Illustrative example: scheduling hours
These figures are illustrative. Price those hours at the attendees' own rates, then add conference preparation separately.
Today, check your bid schedule for a CPM schedule bid item and record the scheduling level before pricing meeting hours.
Related guides: Public bid labor: 6 checks before you lock costs · Carry wage changes in a public bid: 5 steps to check · Check 8 public bid rules before you submit.
Ask the owner three questions in writing before you price
How will retained funds be held?
Get the holding method and the date that starts the release period in writing.
Does the contract include a CPM schedule bid item?
Check the bid schedule and ask the owner to clarify any uncertainty before pricing scheduling work.
Which training route applies to the inspections?
Confirm the applicable permit and whether inspectors will use the EPA course or qualifying non-EPA training, supplemented for missing topics as needed.
Ask the questions early, while the bid is still open. A verbal answer from a site meeting is hard to use later, because nobody can confirm what was said or who said it. Keep the question, the owner's answer, and the date in your bid file.
Keep a short list of open questions until the owner has answered each one. Do not fill a gap with a guess and carry that guess into the price without a note saying so.
If a contract revision or a later answer changes any of these points, update the price. Retainage timing, training requirements, and the scheduling level each affect a different part of your cost plan, so a change to one may not touch the others. Check all three after every change rather than assuming the rest still holds.
Also keep the questions tied to the governing document. For Washington retainage, the governing text is the statute. For inspector training, the governing text is the 2022 permit and the EPA guidance on it. For Caltrans scheduling, the governing text is the Caltrans manual and the contract's specifications. Ask about the document that actually applies to your project, not a similar one from another agency.
State each assumption in your proposal so the owner can see the price
State each of the three costs as an assumption in your proposal, so the owner can see what the price includes and what it does not. A short assumptions section is easier to defend than a number that appears to include everything, and easier to revise if the answers change.
For retainage, state how you have priced the wait for release and how bond premiums are treated. For inspector training, state which route your inspectors use and that the certification will be kept current. For CPM scheduling, state the level that applies and the number of weeks you assumed for baseline acceptance.
Keep the wording plain. An assumption should say what you priced and what you did not, without a long explanation. If you assumed a number of weeks for the scheduling meetings, say so. If you assumed an interest rate for the held balance, say so. The owner may disagree with an assumption, and that conversation is far easier when the assumption is written down.
Attach each assumption to the line it affects. An assumption about release timing belongs next to the retainage line, not in a general notes section at the back, so the reader can match the number to its reason.
Price each cost on its own line
Price retainage, inspector training, and CPM scheduling as separate lines so each one stays visible from bid to close. Keeping them apart lets you check each rule against its own source and change one without reopening the others. Check each figure against its source before you submit, and review all three lines again if the bid is revised. Use the construction estimate audit for your wider bid review.
For inspector training, price the EPA course or a qualifying non-EPA course, supplemented as needed to cover missing minimum topics.