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Join the Costimate Expert Network

Sign up as an independent expert, what Costimate checks before companies can find you, the network agreement you sign in Costimate, your Costimate rate and your public profile.

The Costimate Expert Network is independent experts who work on bids with the companies that use Costimate: bid managers, writers, estimators, compliance leads. Companies find you by your sectors and your roles, and invite you to the bids you fit. You stay independent: what you agree with a company is between you and that company, and Costimate takes no commission on it.

Sign up

  1. On the sign-in page, choose Sign up as an expert, at the right of Sign in and Create account.
  2. You: your name, work email, password, country, mobile and a headline, such as "Senior estimator".
  3. Expertise: your industries, your roles, your hourly and daily rates in US dollars, your availability, the languages you work in, and a short bio.
  4. Experience: where you have worked and what you studied. Add what you like now; the rest can wait.
  5. References and agreement: bids you have worked on, then the terms, and whether your profile is public.
  6. Choose Create expert account, and confirm your email address from the message you receive.
The second step of an expert's sign-up, Expertise: their industries and roles, hourly and daily rates, availability, languages and a short bio.
  1. The four steps, and where you are.
  2. Industries: the sectors you work in. Companies, and the tenders offered to you, follow them.
  3. Role details: the roles you take on a bid.
  4. Your hourly rate, in US dollars.
  5. Your daily rate, in US dollars.
  6. Continue to the next step. Everything you typed is kept if you go back.

At the last step one tick is required: you accept the Terms of Service and the Expert Terms, and have read the Privacy Policy. The tick Show my profile publicly on costimate.net is yours to choose, and you can change it at any time.

While Costimate checks your profile

Costimate reviews every new expert before companies can find them. Until then you can sign in and complete your profile, and every other page says your account is waiting, with Complete your profile meanwhile. You hear from us by email once it is decided. Meanwhile you are in no company's list of experts, and nobody can invite you.

Once you are approved, companies find you in their list of experts, and your portal opens on My business. See My business.

The network agreement

The Costimate Expert Network Agreement is between you and Costimate. It says you are independent, that Costimate takes no fee on work companies engage you for, what Costimate pays for its own engagements, how your name and profile may be used, and that what companies share with you stays confidential.

  1. Costimate sends it once you are approved. You are told in the bell and by email, and My business says Sign your network agreement.
  2. Open it, and read it with Open the agreement.
  3. Tick "I have read the Costimate Expert Network Agreement and agree to sign it electronically.", type your full name, and choose Sign. Or choose Decline, with a reason.

Costimate records the moment you signed, your device and network address and the name you typed, and adds a page to the document that names both sides. Signed copy downloads it. Once it is signed, companies see Verified expert beside your name.

Your Costimate rate

Beside your own rates, your profile shows your Costimate rate: 70% of yours. It is what Costimate pays you when it engages you for its own work, as the agreement says. Only you and Costimate see it, never a company.

Your public profile

The Costimate Expert Network card on an expert's profile: the switch that shows the profile on Our experts once Costimate features it, when it was switched on, and the expert's Costimate rate.
  1. Show my profile publicly on costimate.net: on or off, at any time.
  2. When you switched it on.
  3. Your Costimate rate.

Your profile is shown on the site's Our experts page once three things hold: you switched it on, Costimate chose to feature you, and you signed the network agreement. It shows your photo, name, headline, country, industries, roles, languages, bio, and a quote of your own if you add one. Never your email, phone, rates, availability, references, positions or education. Switching it off takes you off the site at once.

Your card also has your referral link: a company that signs up through it is noted as referred by you.

Good to know

  • An expert is never a member of a company and never takes one of its seats. You see only what a company shares with you.
  • When the Expert Terms change, you are asked to accept them again the next time you open your portal.
  • Deleting your account removes your profile. A signed agreement is kept for six years, for Costimate's records.