Compare Commercial Security Proposals Line by Line, Free

This page is for the buyer who already has proposals. Two or three commercial security bids are on your desk, the totals are thousands of dollars apart, and nothing in the documents tells you whether the gap is price or scope. Send them to us and we return one normalized matrix: every bid in its own column, every line item in its own row, the scope gaps flagged, and the 1, 3 and 5 year totals worked out. We do not install, do not monitor, and do not sell or mark up equipment. Contractors pay us for introductions, so no proposal on your table pays us more than another. The comparison is free and carries no obligation.

Already have proposals? Start here. No quotes yet? Start with how it works, which covers the path for a buyer who wants screened contractors to price a building from scratch.

Who compares commercial security proposals line by line?

We do. We are an independent quote comparison service for commercial security systems. We put the proposals you hold, and any re-quotes from licensed, insured contractors in our network, in one matrix, normalize the scope, and show installed cost, recurring fees, contract term and equipment ownership side by side. We do not install, monitor or mark up equipment, and the service is free to the business.

The alternative is a paid independent security consultant, which is the right call for some projects, and we say when below. For a single building with two or three bids from commercial security systems companies, the question is usually narrower: is the cheaper bid cheaper, or just smaller? That is what a normalized comparison answers.

What a line-by-line comparison shows

Below is the deliverable, built from three anonymized bids for a 6,000 sq. ft. single-tenant office: intrusion alarm, two access-controlled doors, six cameras, and monitoring. Rows are the items that actually move the price. Cells marked not stated are gaps we flag, because a missing line is where the change order lives.

Read across any row and the differences are visible in seconds. Bid C is the cheapest named-hardware bid until you add cabling it excluded and the two cameras it dropped. Bid B is the lowest headline number and the only one where you own nothing at the end. None of that is apparent from three PDFs with three different layouts.

What a normalized security bid comparison covers

A proper comparison normalizes every one of these before it compares a single dollar:

• Model and quantity for every camera, reader, lock, panel, keypad, sensor and horn
• Software licensing: what is included, for how long, and what renews
• Servers and storage: recorder channels, terabytes, and the retention period they actually deliver
• Cabling: drop count, cable grade, and whether pathways, conduit or lifts are included
• Labor and programming hours, plus commissioning and user training
• Integrations between access control, video and intrusion
• Warranty term, split into parts and labor
• Recurring monitoring and cloud fees, written as a monthly figure
• Exclusions and allowances
• Contract term, escalation clause, auto-renewal and notice window
• Who owns the equipment at the end of the term

Why two bids with different totals are often not comparable

Different totals can describe different jobs. The gaps that cause it, each with the line responsible:

• Device count drift. One bid covers six cameras and the other four, because one contractor walked the site and the other priced the floor plan.
• Retention that does not match the requirement. By the 1 TB per camera per month rule in our camera cost guide, a 4 TB recorder on six 1080p cameras holds roughly three weeks of continuous footage, not the 30 days you asked for, and 4K halves that.
• Cabling in or out. Fourteen drops at $150 to $300 each is $2,100 to $4,200 that one bid carries and another leaves for the change order.
• Licensing moved from capital to recurring. A cloud bid shifts the access control and video software into a monthly line that never appears in the installed price.
• Door hardware scope. Reader and strike only, versus reader, strike, request-to-exit and door contact. The second is a working door; the first is a reader on a wall.
• Training and commissioning. Included in one, a separate line in another, silent in the third.
• Monitoring path. IP-only monitoring is cheaper than cellular or dual-path, which our monitoring cost guide prices at a $5 to $20 per month premium, and the two paths are not the same product.
• Ownership. A cheap monthly rate is often subsidized equipment, which means the provider retains the panel, as our alarm monitoring page explains.

A cheaper proposal is cheaper only if it delivers the same device counts, retention, cabling, warranty and ownership for less. If any of those are smaller, it is a smaller job, and the right move is to price the missing scope at market rates and add it back before comparing.

Worked example: the lower headline price that costs more

Take Bid A and Bid B from the matrix. Both include six cameras, two doors and intrusion. Bid B is $4,400 cheaper on the day of install.

Bid A: $14,200 installed, $55 per month monitoring, 36-month term, no cloud fees, customer owns the equipment.
Bid B: $9,800 installed, $65 per month monitoring plus $90 per month cloud video ($155 per month total), 60-month term, provider retains the panel and cameras. The per-door cloud license is billed monthly but unpriced in the proposal, so it is excluded here and flagged as a gap; the real Bid B total is higher.

• 1 year: Bid A $14,200 + $660 = $14,860. Bid B $9,800 + $1,860 = $11,660.
• 3 years: Bid A $14,200 + $1,980 = $16,180. Bid B $9,800 + $5,580 = $15,380.
• 5 years: Bid A $14,200 + $3,300 = $17,500. Bid B $9,800 + $9,300 = $19,100.

At year five, the cheaper bid costs $1,600 more, you still own none of the hardware, and the 60-month agreement renews for another full term unless you cancel inside the notice window. Add an unstated escalator and the gap widens every year. Bid A's term ends at month 36, after which monitoring is month-to-month and the equipment is yours to put under any monitoring provider at the rates in our business alarm monitoring cost guide. Neither bid is wrong. Bid B is a lower-capital choice with a higher operating cost and no residual asset, and the buyer should pick it knowing that.

The figures sit inside the ranges in our commercial security system cost guide: $1,200 to $3,500 per access-controlled door installed, $500 to $900 per standard IP camera installed, $1,000 to $5,000 for intrusion in a small building, and $30 to $75 per month for basic commercial monitoring. The cloud figure, $10 to $30 per camera per month for 30-day retention, comes from our camera cost guide. Cost figures on this page were last checked against our published guides in October 2026.

How to work out the 1, 3 and 5 year total of any proposal

Multiply every recurring line (monitoring, cloud storage, software licenses, service plans) by 12, 36 and 60, apply any stated escalator, and add the installed price. Then note the term length and ownership next to each total, because a 60-month total you cannot exit is different from a 36-month total you can. The full method, including the missing-scope adjustment, is in our guide to comparing commercial security system quotes line by line.

How we stay independent

Our model is simple: free to the business asking, paid by the contractor quoting. Licensed contractors in our network pay us for introductions, so our revenue does not change based on which bid wins or how large it is. We have no equipment to sell, no monitoring contracts to write and no installation crews to keep busy. If the comparison shows the proposal you already like is complete and competitively priced, the matrix will show that, and nothing changes for us.

The reviewer test worth applying to anyone who offers to compare your bids: do they sell the equipment, install it, monitor it, or earn a commission from the winning vendor? If yes to any, the comparison is a sales document. We answer no to all four.

How contractors are screened

If a bid comes back short and you want a replacement quote on the standardized scope, it comes from a contractor who has already cleared the four checks we describe on our how it works and services pages:

• State license, checked against the state licensing board, not a logo on a truck
• Insurance, general liability verified by certificate of insurance
• Review and complaint history, scanned for patterns rather than one-off grudges; firms that generate complaints leave the network
• Building-type experience in your category, whether that is a dispensary with a state retention rule, a clinic with HIPAA exposure, or a school with lockdown hardware requirements

We also note industry credentials where contractors hold them: UL-listed central stations, NICET-certified technicians and TMA Five Diamond monitoring.

What to send us

Start with the building profile on our quote form; when we confirm receipt, we ask for the proposals and the counts the form does not capture. The full set we work from:

• The proposals, as PDFs or whatever the contractors gave you, including any attached contract or monitoring agreement
• Square footage and number of floors or buildings
• Door count to be controlled, and camera count you intend to cover
• Occupancy type (office, retail, warehouse, dispensary, clinic, school, multifamily)
• Your timeline
• Any existing equipment: panel, recorder, cameras or readers you expect to keep

Anything you cannot find is fine to leave out; we flag it as a gap and it becomes a question for the bidders. We confirm receipt and tell you when to expect the matrix once we have the documents.

What does this cost, and how is it free?

The comparison costs the business nothing, with no obligation to accept any bid. The licensed contractors in our network pay us for introductions; that is the whole model. We do not take a percentage of the winning contract and do not charge the business at any stage.

If a bid comes back short

When the matrix shows a gap, you have three options and we support all of them. First, send the gap list back to the bidder and ask for a revised proposal that fills it; a corrected number is still their number. Second, price the missing scope at market rates from our cost guides and compare on the adjusted total. Third, request a re-quote on the standardized scope from one or two screened contractors in your area, so you have a complete bid to set beside the ones you hold.

We do not negotiate with the bidders for you, and we do not recommend a winner. We put comparable numbers in front of you with the differences made visible; the decision, and the negotiation that follows it, stays yours.

Independent consultant or free comparison service?

A paid independent security consultant designs the system, writes the specification, runs a formal RFP, checks each proposal against that spec, and produces a ranked recommendation with a report. That is the right path for large capital projects, multi-site programs, campus or healthcare environments with formal procurement rules, and any project where the design itself needs an engineer's stamp. Expect to pay for the hours, priced against the size of the project.

A free comparison service is enough when the system is already defined by the bids in hand, the project is a single building or a handful of sites, and the decision is which of two or three proposals to sign. You get the normalized matrix, the gap flags and the multi-year totals; you do not get a stamped design or a recommendation letter. If the matrix shows the bids are so far apart that the scope itself is unsettled, that is a sign the project may need a consultant, and we will say so.

Send us the proposals

If you are holding two or three security proposals and want them lined up by someone with nothing riding on the outcome, submit your building profile, and we will ask for the proposals and door and camera counts when we confirm receipt. Every line is checked against our published cost guides. If you have no proposals yet, the same form starts the process of getting comparable quotes from screened contractors. Either way the service is free, carries no obligation, and ends with you choosing.

Frequently asked questions

How do I compare two security bids that include different scopes?

Normalize before you compare. Put both bids in one table with a row for every device, license, storage, cabling, labor, warranty, recurring fee, exclusion, term and ownership item, mark every row one bid omits, and price the omissions at market rates so both columns describe the same job. Only then compare installed price and 1, 3 and 5 year totals.

How do I tell whether a cheaper security proposal is cheaper or just smaller?

Check device counts, retention period, cabling, warranty and ownership row by row. If the cheaper bid matches on all of them, it is cheaper. If any are reduced, excluded or moved to a monthly fee, it is a smaller job or a different payment structure, and the difference should be priced back in before you decide.

What hidden or recurring charges show up in commercial security proposals?

The common ones are cloud video storage per camera per month, per-door or per-user software licenses, cellular communicator fees, service plans, annual rate escalators, and auto-renewal clauses that extend a 60-month term for another full term. Our monitoring cost guide gives ranges for cellular communicator and cloud storage fees and explains how renewal and termination clauses work.

Who owns the equipment at the end of the contract, and where is that in a proposal?

Look in the monitoring or service agreement rather than the equipment list, usually under headings like "title to equipment," "ownership" or "termination." A low monthly rate paired with a long term is often subsidized equipment, which means the provider retains the panel. If the agreement is silent, ask for ownership to be stated in writing before signing.

How do I know the reviewer is not being paid by one of the bidders?

Ask how the reviewer makes money. If they install, monitor, sell equipment or receive a commission from the winning vendor, they have a stake in the outcome. We are paid introduction fees by contractors in our network regardless of which bid wins, and we do not install, monitor or sell anything.

Do I need an independent security consultant, or can a quote service do this?

Hire a consultant for large capital projects, formal RFPs, or when the system still needs to be designed and specified. A free comparison service is enough when the bids in hand already define the system and you need them normalized, gap-checked and totaled over 1, 3 and 5 years for a single building or a few sites.