It’s hard to imagine dealing with snow and ice at your facility when summer’s still officially here. But the challenges of winter weather will be here sooner than you think, and the sooner you start planning for ice and snow removal services, the better.

Over the past three years, the Snow & Ice Management Association (SIMA) has established a productive dialogue between its staff, snow and ice management professionals, and facilities and property managers across North America to focus attention on the procurement process for snow removal services.
Best practices for snow and ice management is critical for business continuity and to ensure safety for patrons, tenants, and employees. Knowing how to describe your service requirements in a snow and ice management request for proposal (RFP) is difficult, particularly given the variability of winter weather and the wide variety of property types.
Based on discussion with and feedback from industry stakeholders from FMs/PMs, snow contractors, insurance, industry consultants, and equipment manufacturers, SIMA has developed best practices designed to better align all stakeholders for success when purchasing snow services. Purchasing Snow & Ice Management: Quality RFP Creation and Best Practices organizes the snow and ice management service procurement process to aid in the creation of RFPs, contracts, and monitoring procedures.
Brian Birch, SIMA Chief Operating Officer explains, “This guide is the culmination of years of collaboration between snow contractors and facilities and property managers. It is the definitive guide to buying snow services effectively – the goal to help ensure clarity, transparency, and fairness within the snow RFP process.”
The document is divided into chapters that focus on the following:
- A 52-week procurement timeline that outlines dates to follow to ensure snow service contracts are issued far enough in advance to allow the snow contractor ample time to procure and allocate resources for the service site(s).
- Defining a clear Level of Service to ensure that those bidding for your services are pricing appropriately.
- Understanding what goes into creating a Scope of Work to meet the Level of Service requirements.
- Defining terms and conditions and the role they play in the RFP process, including contract fee types, payment and billing best practices, insurance requirements, documentation and service validation, and cessation of services.
The document also utilizes additional SIMA resources that have been created to bring all industry stakeholders to the same page when negotiating snow and ice management contracts: The Glossary of Terms, complementary best practices checklists, and a site engineering sell sheet. These resources are free and available to all industry participants, regardless of whether they are a SIMA member.
You can download Purchasing Snow & Ice Management: Quality RFP Creation and Best Practices here.