Two signed agreements for the same kind of work
When a town solicits on-call professional services, such as engineering review, planning support, data analysis or technical consulting, it often awards agreements to two or three firms rather than one. To a council member reading the agenda, that can look like a town that could not make up its mind. It is usually the opposite. A multiple award is a deliberate choice that buys capacity, independence and continued competition, and it pays off only when the agreements and the assignment process are built for it.
The award itself is the easy part. The work starts afterward: deciding which firm gets which task, keeping terms consistent across firms, tracking performance fairly, and keeping both firms willing to answer the phone when the town calls. A multiple award run casually becomes one firm that gets everything and a second firm that stops bidding next time.
This article covers why towns make multiple awards, how to assign work so the process holds up to scrutiny, what the agreements need to say, and when a single award is the better choice.
Four reasons towns award to more than one firm
The reasons are practical, and each one solves a problem a single award cannot.
- Capacity. Application volume is lumpy. Three large applications can land in the same month, and one firm may not be able to staff all three inside the review deadlines.
- Conflicts. A firm that works for a developer, a utility or a wireless provider cannot review that party's application for the town. A second firm keeps the review moving.
- Backup. Key staff leave, firms merge, and contracts get terminated. A second agreement already in place means the town does not start a new solicitation in the middle of a busy season.
- Continued competition. When firms know work can go elsewhere, turnaround and quality tend to hold. The town also gets a running comparison of price and performance.
Conflicts are the reason most often underestimated. Specialized review fields are small, and the firms most qualified to review an application are frequently the same firms applicants hire. A town with one reviewer will eventually face an application that reviewer cannot touch, and will be hunting for a replacement while the clock runs.
Single award versus multiple award
The trade-offs are real on both sides. A multiple award is not automatically better.
| Factor | Single award | Multiple award |
|---|---|---|
| Administration | One agreement, one set of invoices, one relationship | Several agreements, an assignment process, and records showing why each task went where it did |
| Capacity | Limited to what one firm can staff at once | Work can be spread when volume spikes |
| Conflicts of interest | A conflicted firm leaves the town without a reviewer for that application | The next firm takes the task with no gap |
| Consistency of review | One firm's methods and standards on every application | Two firms may interpret the same code differently unless the town sets a common standard |
| Firm commitment | The firm has a clear stake and invests in learning the town | Each firm's share is uncertain, so investment depends on how fairly work is spread |
| Price pressure | Set once at award, then renegotiated at renewal | Continues through the term when tasks are competed or performance shapes assignments |
Consistency is the cost towns notice last. If one firm reads the parking requirement one way and the second firm reads it another, applicants will learn which reviewer to hope for. The fix is a written review standard the town owns, which every firm follows.
Setting it up in the solicitation
The ability to make more than one award has to be announced before proposals arrive. State in the request for qualifications or proposals that the town intends to, or reserves the right to, award to more than one firm, how many it expects, and how work will be assigned among them. Firms price and staff differently when they know they will share the work, and an undisclosed multiple award invites a protest.
Check the selection method your state requires for the type of service. Many states follow a qualifications-based selection process for engineering and architectural services, in which firms are ranked on qualifications and price is negotiated with the top-ranked firm rather than used to choose among them. That rule can shape how tasks are assigned later, because a price-based competition at the task level may not fit a qualifications-based law. When federal grant funds pay for the work, the federal procurement standards for grant recipients apply as well. Confirm both with the town attorney and the purchasing officer.
Evaluate every firm against the same criteria, and award to the firms that rank highest. A multiple award is not an invitation to add a firm the panel ranked poorly, and the evaluation record should show that every firm on the bench earned its seat.
Three ways to assign the work
Pick one primary method, write it into the agreements, and follow it. Applicants, firms and auditors all care less about which method a town uses than whether it uses the one it wrote down.
Rotation. Tasks go to each firm in turn, skipping any firm with a conflict or a capacity problem, and the skipped firm keeps its place for the next task. Rotation is simple, easy to defend and spreads work evenly. Its weakness is that it ignores fit: the firm with the stronger traffic engineer gets the drainage-heavy application if its turn comes up.
Best fit. Staff assigns each task to the firm whose expertise, availability and familiarity best match it, and records the reason in a sentence. Best fit produces the strongest reviews when the firms have different strengths. Its weakness is that it can drift into favoritism, or the appearance of it, unless the reasons are written down every time.
Mini-quotes. Staff sends a short scope to every firm without a conflict and asks for a fixed price, an hour estimate, or a proposed schedule within a few days. The town selects on the stated criteria. Mini-quotes keep price competition alive through the term and work well for larger, well-defined tasks. They cost staff time and slow the start, so they suit occasional large tasks better than routine weekly reviews. Check that a price-based quote is allowed for the service under your state's selection law.
Many towns combine the three: rotation for routine work, best fit for specialized tasks with a written reason, and mini-quotes above a stated dollar threshold.
Whichever method applies, run the conflict check before the assignment, not after. Send the firm the applicant's name, the property, and the names of any consultants already on the applicant's team, and ask for a written answer within a day. A firm that discovers a conflict halfway through a review costs the town the time already spent and may taint the comments it has issued. A one-line confirmation in the file prevents both.
Assigning a single task
Whatever the method, every assignment should follow the same short sequence and leave the same record.
Task assignment, illustrative timing
Keep an assignment log: the date, the task, the method, the firm selected, any firm skipped and why, and the task order value. The log takes a minute per task and answers almost every question a council member, an auditor or a losing firm will ever ask.
Terms that must match across firms
The agreements should be identical except where a difference is deliberate and documented. Differences in rates or turnaround standards between firms create incentives the town did not intend, and they make performance comparisons meaningless.
- A rate schedule by labor category, fixed for the term, with any annual adjustment stated
- Turnaround standards by task type, tied to the town's legal review deadlines
- The assignment method and an express statement that no minimum volume is guaranteed
- A written task order required before any billable work begins
- Insurance types and limits, identical for every firm, set by the town's risk manager
- Key personnel named, with town approval required to substitute them
- Conflict-of-interest disclosure before each task, and a standing duty to disclose new conflicts
- Town ownership of work products and data, with a defined handover format
- Invoicing detail by task, person and hours, and the review standard firms must follow
- Termination for convenience and for cause, with transfer of open tasks
The statement that no minimum volume is guaranteed protects the town, and it should be paired with an honest estimate in the solicitation of how much work the town expects. Firms plan staffing around that number. Overstating it to attract proposals costs the town credibility at the next solicitation.
Managing performance across firms
With two firms doing similar work, the town has something a single award never provides: a comparison. Use it, but measure the same things the same way for both firms.
Track a few measures per task: whether the deliverable met the deadline, whether the first-round comments were complete, how many rounds the review took, and whether the invoice matched the estimate. Add a two-sentence note from the staff member who managed the task. Review the totals with each firm twice a year, privately, and share the findings in writing.
Feed performance back into assignment. Under a best-fit method, a firm that consistently misses deadlines should see fewer assignments, and the log should show the reason. Under rotation, the agreement can allow the town to skip a firm whose open tasks are late. Without some consequence, the comparison becomes a report nobody acts on.
Keep the review standard current. When the two firms disagree on how to read a code provision, staff should decide the question, write down the answer and send it to both firms. Over a few years that document becomes one of the most valuable things the program produces. A multiple award only creates competition if the firms can see that performance changes who gets the next task.
Keeping every firm engaged
The quiet failure of a multiple award is a second firm that receives so little work it stops treating the town as a client. When the conflict arrives and the town calls, the firm's best people are committed elsewhere.
Spread enough work to keep each firm current with the town's code, staff and systems. A firm that has not reviewed an application in a year will need time to relearn the town, and the applicant will pay for it. If volume is too thin to support two firms, that is a sign the town needs a single award with a narrow backup clause rather than two full agreements.
Treat both firms the same in communication. Send code changes, form updates and process changes to every firm at the same time. Invite both to the same coordination meetings. Small signs of favoritism are noticed quickly in a field where firms compete for the same staff and the same clients.
When a single award is the better choice
Multiple awards solve specific problems. When those problems are absent, a single award is simpler, cheaper to run and often produces a better relationship.
Choose a single award when volume is low and steady enough for one firm to handle, when the work depends on deep familiarity with the town's systems or records, when the field has very few qualified firms and splitting the work would discourage the best one from bidding, or when consistency of interpretation matters more than anything else. A single award can still include a backup provision allowing the town to use another firm when the primary has a conflict.
A backup provision is short. It names the secondary firm, states that the town will use it only when the primary firm has a conflict, lacks capacity within the review deadline, or is otherwise unable to perform, and applies the same rates and terms. The secondary firm gets little work and should be told so plainly in the solicitation, so the firms that propose for it know what they are agreeing to.
Revisit the choice at each renewal. Application volume, staff turnover and the conflict picture all change, and the structure should follow them.
Frequently asked questions
Generally yes, if the solicitation said so in advance and the selection followed the procurement rules that apply to the service. Some states require a qualifications-based process for engineering and architectural services, which affects how work can later be assigned. Confirm the rules with the town attorney and purchasing officer before issuing the solicitation.
By a method written into the agreements: rotation, best fit with a written reason, or mini-quotes for larger tasks, or a stated combination. What matters most is that the town follows the method it wrote down and keeps a log of each assignment and the reason for it.
Not necessarily, since each firm proposes its own rates. The other terms, including turnaround standards, insurance, invoicing detail and ownership of work products, should match so the agreements are comparable and no firm has an advantage the town did not intend.
Document it task by task, share the findings with the firm in writing, and let the assignment method reflect it where the agreement allows. If performance does not improve, the termination and non-renewal terms are there for a reason.