DIVISION 27 / 28 · SECURITY AND LOW VOLTAGE
Estimating software for security and low-voltage contractors
Cameras, readers, door contacts, panels, head-end and the cable between them — taken off the drawings you were sent, reviewed sheet by sheet by your estimator, and carried into a proposal that shows the GC a price and not your cost.
AI-assisted. Estimator-controlled. Traceable to the plan.
Why does a low-voltage bid go wrong?
Rarely because someone cannot count. It goes wrong because the device count lives in three places that disagree with each other, and the bid is due Thursday.
- The floor plans, the riser diagram and the device schedule each imply a different number, and nobody has time to reconcile all three.
- Owner-furnished devices: the spec says cameras are OFCI, a note on a sheet says otherwise, and the bid either eats the hardware or looks high.
- Pathway "by others" — conduit, sleeves, J-hooks, core drilling — assumed in by you and assumed out by the electrician.
- Electrified door hardware sitting on the line between Division 08 and Division 28, where both trades price the strike or neither does.
- Head-end and rack elevation counted from one sheet and mounted on another, so the same switch is in the bid twice.
- Occupied-facility work: after-hours access, escorts and ceiling access that never appear in the device count but always appear in the labor.
What BidStream proposes on your drawings
Device detections, sheet by sheet
Assisted detection reads the drawing geometry and proposes copies of a repeated device symbol for review; a vision pass handles scanned or photocopied sets. Each proposal appears on its source sheet in a review card — approve it, reject it, or send it back as unclear.
Cable and pathway measurement
Lengths and areas are measured on a scale you confirm per sheet, so homerun estimates and pathway lengths come from the drawing rather than from a multiplier applied to a device count.
The scope read before the takeoff
Notes, cover sheet and specifications are read before any counting, and what they imply for your bid — exclusions, allowances, RFIs, scope that belongs to another trade — is proposed for you to accept or discard.
The proposal that leaves the building
Approved quantities feed the line items; the proposal is generated from the estimate under your branding, with a shareable link that shows sell price only — verified as of October 2, 2026.
Which exclusions decide a Division 27/28 bid?
The exclusions page is where a low-voltage bid is won or lost months later, in the change-order conversation. Catching them during the scope read instead of after the award is most of the value.
- Conduit, sleeves, back boxes and firestopping by the electrical contractor.
- 120V power at the head-end, panels and powered devices.
- Core drilling, patching and painting after penetrations.
- Ceiling access, lift work and after-hours or escorted access in occupied facilities.
- Programming, licensing, recurring software and monitoring beyond the first term.
- Owner-furnished devices, and who warrants them once you have installed them.
- Pathway above inaccessible ceilings, and work in areas not released at the time of bid.
THE QUESTIONS WE ACTUALLY GET
Before you book anything
We already have a spreadsheet and a counting process that works.
Then the question is what happens the week three TI bids are due together. That is when a working process starts producing a careful bid and a fast bid, and the fast one is the one that comes back as a change order. BidStream is aimed at that week, not at the comfortable one.
How much setup before it is useful on a real bid?
You load the PDF set the GC sent and confirm the scale per sheet. There is no device library to build first and no migration before the first takeoff. Confirming the scale is the one step that cannot be skipped, because every measured length depends on it.
Why would I trust AI to count my devices?
You approve every detection it proposes, on the sheet it came from. The AI does not post a count to your bid; it hands you a reviewed list, and uncertain items are flagged rather than assumed. The count that reaches the GC is one your estimator signed off on.
Does the general contractor see my cost or my margin?
No. The shared proposal link shows sell prices only; cost and margin do not travel with it. Verified as of October 2, 2026, and re-verified every release.
Can my estimator override the detections?
Every proposed detection is approved or rejected individually, and measurements are adjusted by hand on the sheet. The line item recalculates from the quantity your estimator approved, not from the one the model proposed.
Does this replace my takeoff tool?
For counting, measuring, markup and the handoff into an estimate and a proposal, usually yes. If your current tool also does something specific to your shop, bring it to the walkthrough — we would rather tell you where it does not overlap than find out after you have switched.
Put it on a low-voltage bid you are pricing now
Book a 20-minute walkthrough on one of your current bids. Nothing to send beforehand — bring the job you are bidding this week.