Solicitations and Offers

Here's a short primer on two terms - "solicitation" and "offer" - as used in Government procurement. Certain terms have specific meaning but are often used interchangeably and/or incorrectly.

The term "solicitation" in the context of Government procurement is a generic term that is used to describe requests to submit offers or quotations to the Government.

• Solicitations under Simplified Acquisition Procedures are called RFQs (Request for Quotation).
• Solicitations under Sealed Bid procedures are called IFBs (Invitation for Bid).
• Solicitations under competitive or negotiated procedures are called RFPs (Request for Proposal)

The term "offer" means a response to a solication that, if accepted, would bind the offeror to perform the resultant contract.

• Responses to RFQs are called "quotations".
• Responses to IFBs are called "bids" or "sealed bids"
• Responses to RFPs are called "proposals"

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On a related note, if you ever need to look up a military acronym or definition, one of the best websites we have found for that purpose is military-dictionary.org.