1. (a) Official bid amount. Except for lump sum building contract bid items, the official total bid amount for each bidder will be determined by multiplying the unit bid price written in for each item by the respective quantity and totaling those amounts.

2. (b) Department interpretations.

   1. (1) Proposals where unit bid prices have been left blank will be considered by the department to be incomplete and nonresponsive. If a proposal has a regular and a corresponding alternate bid item or group of items, the proposal will not be considered to be incomplete if either the regular bid item, or group of items, or the alternate bid item, or group of items, has a unit bid price entered. If both a regular bid item, or group of items, and a corresponding alternate bid item, or group of items, are left blank, the bid will be considered to be incomplete and nonresponsive (A bidder who elects to bid on a bid item group corresponding to a regular or alternate bid item, or group of items, must include unit bid prices for each bid item contained in the bid item group).
   2. (2) Proposal entries such as no dollars and no cents, zero dollars and zero cents, or numerical entries of $0.00 will be interpreted to be one-tenth of a cent ($.001) and will be entered in the bid tabulation as $.001, except as provided in paragraph (6) of this subsection. Any entry extended to more than three decimal places will be rounded to the nearest tenth of a cent and entered as such. (For rounding purposes contained in this subsection, entries of five-hundredths of a cent or more will be rounded up to the next highest tenth of a cent, while entries of four-hundredths of a cent or less will be rounded down to the next lowest tenth of a cent).
   3. (3) If a bidder submits both a completed proposal form and a properly completed computer printout, the department will use the computer printout to determine the total bid amount of the proposal. If the computer printout is incomplete, the department will use the completed proposal form to determine the total bid amount of the proposal.
   4. (4) If a bidder submits two computer printouts reflecting different totals, both printouts will be tabulated, and the department will use the lowest tabulation.
   5. (5) If a unit bid price is illegible, the department will make a documented determination of the unit bid price for tabulation purposes.

   6. (6) If a unit bid price has been entered for both the regular bid item, or group of items, and a corresponding alternate bid item, or group of items, the department will determine the option that results in the lowest total cost to the state and tabulate as such, except as provided in subparagraphs (A) and (B) of this paragraph. If both the regular and alternate bids result in the same cost to the state the department will select the regular bid item or items.

      1. (A) If both a regular bid item or a group of items, and a corresponding alternate bid item or group of items, have an entry such as no dollars and no cents, zero dollars and zero cents, or numerical entries of $0.00, the department will make two calculations using one-tenth of a cent ($.001) for each item as described in subparagraph (2) of this subsection. The department will determine the option that results in the lowest total cost to the state and tabulate as such. If both the regular and alternate bids result in the same cost to the state the department will select the regular bid item or items.
      2. (B) If a unit bid price greater than zero has been entered for either a regular bid or corresponding alternate bid item, or a group of items, and an entry of no dollars and no cents, zero dollars and zero cents, or a numerical entry of $0.00 has been entered for the other corresponding item, or group of items, the department will use the unit bid price that is greater than zero for bid tabulation.
3. (c) Tie bids. In the event the official bid amount for two or more bidders is equal and those bids are the lowest submitted, each tie bidder will be given an opportunity to withdraw its bid. If two or more tie bidders decline to withdraw their bids, the low bidder will be determined by a coin toss. If all tie bidders request to withdraw their bids, no withdrawals will be allowed and the low bidder will be determined by a coin toss.

Source Note:The provisions of this §9.16 adopted to be effective November 23, 1994, 19 TexReg 8867; amended to be effective May 25, 1995, 20 TexReg 3574; amended to be effective December 12, 1999, 24 TexReg 10901; amended to be effective January 4, 2001, 25 TexReg 13007.