How Telematics Data Helps Builders Win More Bids

Winning a construction bid requires more than submitting the lowest price. Builders must show that they understand the scope, can control costs, have the necessary equipment, and can complete the work safely and on schedule.

This is especially important when pursuing government and large commercial contracts. According to the Government of Canada’s guidance on preparing to bid on procurement opportunities, bids must satisfy all mandatory requirements and offer the best value for money. Contractors may also need to demonstrate their capacity, experience, safety practices, personnel, and relevant project history.

Telematics data helps builders support those claims with information collected from their own vehicles and equipment. Instead of relying entirely on estimates, assumptions, or handwritten logs, contractors can use location data, engine hours, fuel consumption, trip history, equipment utilization, and maintenance records to prepare more accurate and credible proposals.

Telematics cannot guarantee that a contractor will win a project. However, it can help the company bid more competitively, present a stronger execution plan, and avoid pricing mistakes that make a project unprofitable.

Turn Past Projects Into Better Estimates

Every completed project contains information that can improve the next bid. The challenge is capturing that information in a consistent and usable format.

Telematics systems can record how long equipment operated, how much time it spent idling, how far vehicles travelled, how frequently they visited a site, and how much fuel they consumed. Estimators can compare this information across similar projects to determine what the work actually required.

For example, a contractor preparing a bid for excavation work could review previous projects to determine:

• The average number of excavator hours required per quantity of material moved
• How much time dump trucks spent travelling, loading, unloading, and waiting
• The typical fuel consumption of each equipment class
• How often equipment was inactive because of scheduling conflicts
• The amount of mobilization time required between the yard and jobsite

Wialon’s engine-hours reporting tools can show how long a unit worked, how much time it spent in motion, the fuel consumed during the reporting period, and the operating time of compatible attached equipment. When properly configured, this information can also be used to evaluate utilization and productivity.

Historical telematics data should not replace professional estimating judgment. Site access, soil conditions, weather, labour availability, project specifications, and equipment type can all affect production. The advantage is that estimators begin with verified operating history instead of a generic assumption.

Calculate Equipment Costs More Accurately

Equipment expenses can determine whether a bid is both competitive and profitable. Fuel, maintenance, depreciation, repairs, rentals, transportation, and operator time all contribute to the real cost of completing a project.

The importance of separating equipment ownership and operating expenses is reflected in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Construction Equipment Ownership and Operating Expense Schedule. The schedule is designed to establish fair and reasonable construction-equipment costs and includes regional hourly rates and calculation factors.

Telematics adds company-specific operating information to that process. A builder can combine an internal hourly equipment rate with historical engine hours to estimate the equipment portion of a job. Fuel data can then help determine whether the company’s current allowance reflects real operating conditions.

This can prevent two common bidding problems. Overestimating equipment use may make the bid unnecessarily expensive, while underestimating it may help win the contract but reduce or eliminate the expected profit.

Understand Which Equipment Is Truly Available

An equipment list does not necessarily show whether a contractor has the capacity to take on another project. A machine may be assigned to an existing job, awaiting repairs, underused at another location, or unavailable during a critical stage of the proposed schedule.

Utilization data helps estimators and operations managers understand:

• Which machines are currently active
• How many hours each asset normally works
• Which equipment is regularly underused
• Whether assets can be transferred between projects
• Where rental equipment may still be required
• Whether multiple projects are competing for the same resources

This makes it easier to submit a realistic equipment plan. A contractor may discover that an underused machine can be reassigned to the new project, eliminating an unnecessary rental allowance. In another case, the data may reveal that additional equipment must be rented to protect the schedule.

Both findings improve the bid. The first can lower the proposed price, while the second prevents the contractor from submitting an unrealistically low estimate.

Build More Credible Project Schedules

A strong construction schedule must account for more than the time spent performing the primary work. Mobilization, traffic, loading, unloading, site access, supplier delays, and equipment movement can all affect production.

Wialon reports can be used to analyze trips, stops, parking, mileage, engine hours, fuel consumption, geofence activity, and driving behaviour. Contractors can use this operational history to estimate realistic cycle times for activities such as:

• Transporting aggregate or excavated material
• Delivering concrete and construction supplies
• Moving equipment between yards and jobsites
• Removing waste from the site
• Dispatching service vehicles and field crews

Geofences can be created around jobsites, yards, suppliers, disposal facilities, and other important locations. Wialon supports geofence entry and exit notifications, geofence reports, and trips between defined areas.

By examining the time between these events, a builder can develop more realistic delivery and hauling cycles. This information can strengthen the construction methodology included with the bid and reduce the likelihood of proposing a schedule that cannot be achieved under normal operating conditions.

Reduce Downtime Risk Before the Project Begins

A low bid is not useful if equipment failures cause the project to fall behind schedule. Emergency repairs can create labour delays, rental expenses, missed deliveries, and additional mobilization costs.

Telematics data helps contractors identify equipment that may require service before it is assigned to a new project. In Wialon, service intervals can be managed by kilometres, engine hours, or elapsed days. The system can also show when service is approaching or overdue and support maintenance notifications and reports.

Before finalizing a bid, the equipment manager can review the proposed fleet and determine:

• Whether major service will become due during the project
• Which assets have unresolved maintenance needs
• Whether service should be completed before mobilization
• Which equipment may require backup coverage
• Whether maintenance can be scheduled around critical project phases

This allows the estimator to include realistic maintenance and contingency costs. It also helps the project team present a more credible equipment-readiness plan when the proposal requires one.

Improve Fuel and Idling Estimates

Fuel is one of the most variable equipment costs in construction. Two similar machines can consume different amounts of fuel depending on operating conditions, load, operator behaviour, attachment use, and idle time.

Telematics can help separate productive engine time from unnecessary idling. Builders can compare fuel consumption by asset, equipment class, project, operator, or work activity. They can then use those results to build a more accurate fuel allowance into future proposals.

Controlling idle time can also support environmental commitments. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency identifies idle-reduction practices as a way for construction operations to save fuel and money while reducing emissions.

When a tender asks bidders to explain how they will reduce fuel use, emissions, noise, or unnecessary equipment operation, a contractor can describe a measurable telematics-based process. The proposal might include monitoring idle time, reviewing weekly exceptions, coaching operators, and reporting results by project.

The contractor should avoid promising an exact reduction unless it has reliable historical data to support the claim.

Support Safety and Risk-Management Plans

Safety qualifications can influence whether a builder reaches the bidding stage. The Canadian Construction Documents Committee’s Contractor’s Qualification Statement includes company capacity, experience, personnel, health and safety information, and comparable project history.

Telematics does not replace a construction safety program, operator training, site supervision, inspections, or regulatory compliance. It can, however, add another source of information for identifying vehicle-related risk.

Depending on the tracking equipment and configuration, builders may be able to monitor speeding, harsh acceleration, hard braking, aggressive cornering, and extended idling. Wialon’s Eco Driving reports can organize configured driving events by vehicle, driver, trip, engine hours, or violation type.

Contractors can use these trends to support driver coaching, investigate recurring problems, and demonstrate that fleet risks are being reviewed systematically. In a proposal, this may strengthen sections dealing with vehicle safety, site traffic management, supervision, or continuous improvement.

Provide Evidence of Operational Capacity

Proposal evaluators often want more than a list of equipment. They want confidence that the contractor can mobilize the required resources and manage them effectively.

Telematics reports can help a builder prepare concise evidence such as:

• Average equipment utilization by asset class
• Recent engine-hour and maintenance summaries
• Typical mobilization times
• Historical delivery or hauling-cycle performance
• Fleet availability by project phase
• Idling and fuel-management procedures
• Driver-safety monitoring processes
• Examples of reporting used to manage previous projects

The proposal should present this information as a clear summary, chart, or project example. It is rarely necessary or appropriate to provide unrestricted access to the tracking platform or disclose sensitive location information.

Builders should also follow the exact requirements of each tender. Telematics evidence should support the requested response, not replace mandatory schedules, forms, certifications, or references.

Create Better Records During Project Delivery

Winning the bid is only the beginning. The contractor must then perform the work, manage changes, document progress, and protect the expected margin.

Trip histories, geofence records, engine hours, and equipment-location data can help confirm when tracked assets arrived, left, operated, or remained inactive. These records may support internal job costing, customer updates, equipment billing, progress reviews, and investigations into delays.

For example, a project manager may use telematics records to compare planned and actual equipment hours or determine how long hauling vehicles waited at a loading location. That information can reveal congestion, poor dispatching, supplier delays, or an insufficient number of trucks.

Telematics records should not be treated as the sole contractual record. Device configuration, sensor availability, reporting intervals, GPS reception, and data quality can affect the results. Important events should still be supported by the documentation required under the contract, such as daily reports, tickets, photographs, approvals, and written notices.

Build a Repeatable Bidding Feedback Loop

The greatest bidding value appears when telematics data is reviewed consistently across multiple projects.

A practical process is to assign vehicles and equipment to the correct job, define geofences around project locations, and create standardized reports for engine hours, trips, fuel, idling, maintenance, and utilization. At the end of the project, estimators can compare the original assumptions with actual results.

If a bid assumed 500 equipment hours but the project required 650, the team can investigate why. The difference may have resulted from low production rates, excessive waiting, an unsuitable equipment mix, poor site access, or a change in scope. If the next estimate simply uses 650 hours without understanding the cause, the company may repeat the same inefficiency.

The objective is not merely to collect more data. It is to connect operating information with job costing, scheduling, and estimating decisions.

Turning Wialon Data Into a Competitive Advantage

Wialon can bring vehicle locations, equipment activity, engine hours, trips, geofences, fuel information, maintenance intervals, notifications, and reports into one fleet-management environment. For construction businesses, this creates an opportunity to connect field operations with the estimating process.

The most useful bidding reports will depend on the contractor’s work. An excavation company may focus on engine hours and equipment utilization, while a ready-mix or hauling operation may place greater emphasis on trip cycles, waiting time, and geofence activity. A field-service contractor may prioritize dispatch performance, travel time, and vehicle availability.

Forall Tracking can help construction businesses configure Wialon GPS tracking around the vehicles, equipment, jobsites, and operating metrics that matter to their bids. If you want to improve estimating accuracy, document fleet capacity, and turn telematics data into more competitive proposals, contact us to discuss a tracking and reporting setup for your operation.