Why So Many Companies Struggle To Get Quotes Out Fast
Most companies don’t have a quoting problem. They have a systems problem that happens to show up in quoting. The symptoms are obvious: leads go cold, sales teams get frustrated, engineering feels overloaded, and leadership starts assuming the only fix is “more people.”
In reality, slow quoting almost always comes down to gaps in the way information, priorities, and work are organized. Here are the real reasons quoting gets delayed and what you can do to fix them.
1. Poor Upfront Intake
When a quote request comes in, most teams either get too little information or they ask for way too much. Both cause delays.
Not enough information creates back and forth between sales, the customer, and technical teams. The request sits until someone has time to chase answers. On the other side, some teams try to collect design-level detail before a PO is even close. That forces engineers to solve problems that don’t need to be solved yet.
The fix is straightforward. Define what is actually needed to create a quote and separate it from what belongs later during design signoff. Build a simple intake form or checklist that captures only the essentials. Most companies can remove half their intake questions without losing accuracy.
2. Weak Qualification
A surprising amount of quoting delay comes from working on deals that were never worth quoting in the first place.
Some leads look big on paper but have no real pain behind them. Others aren’t a fit for your capabilities. Some partners use you to put pricing pressure on their preferred vendor. I’ve seen companies burn a week of engineering time on deals with no business justification. I’ve also seen marketing bring in waves of low-value inquiries simply because the targeting wasn’t dialed in. At one company, we used to get constant requests for small batches of autoclave labels from labs and universities. Once we shifted the keyword focus toward cold storage labels used in food, beverage and pharmaceutical manufacturing settings, we started getting inquiries that actually led to revenue.
Better qualification on both the marketing side and the sales side clears up a huge amount of noise. Strong discovery questions, clearer targeting, and defined rules for which deals should involve technical resources make a big difference.
3. Inefficient Internal Workflow
A lot of quoting time is wasted inside the four walls of the company. Manual steps, inconsistent methods, and tribal knowledge slow everything down.
Common issues include double entering data into multiple systems, digging through old emails to find past quotes, rebuilding pricing models from scratch, or relying on the one senior engineer who “knows how to price this stuff.” When that person is in a meeting or out sick, everything stops.
Map your current quoting process and look at where the waste lives. Standardize templates. Build a single source of pricing truth. Create simple estimating guides. Make the process repeatable so the burden doesn’t fall on one or two people.
Visibility also matters. If nobody can see the quote queue, everything feels like a fire drill. A basic board view or Kanban system gives everyone clarity on what’s in progress and what’s stuck.
4. Misaligned Priorities Across Teams
Technical teams have a long list of daily responsibilities. Production issues, customer support, troubleshooting, R&D projects, internal meetings. If quoting isn’t clearly prioritized, it naturally moves to the bottom of the pile.
Some companies also don’t have a defined owner for quote turnaround time. The request bounces between sales, engineering, and management with no one clearly accountable. Add three layers of approvals on top of that and you have a slow system by design.
You can fix this by setting simple service level expectations for how fast quotes should move. Clarify who owns the process. Streamline approvals so routine quotes don’t get stuck behind a director who is on the road. Make it easy for teams to know what matters most.
5. Vendor Bottlenecks
If your quote depends on vendor pricing or technical confirmation, your speed is now tied to someone else’s responsiveness. Many companies lose days this way.
Sometimes the problem is the vendor. Sometimes it’s the quality of the information being sent to them. I’ve seen engineers send half-complete RFQs and then wonder why the vendor needs clarification. I’ve also seen teams rely on email for everything when a quick phone call would get the answer in five minutes.
You can work with your vendors to improve turnaround times or provide clearer RFQ details. Some vendors have self-service tools you can use instead of waiting. In some cases, you can build internal estimating models that give you a solid directional price without waiting for outside input. And if a vendor consistently slows you down, it might be time to find a better partner.
6. Organizational Friction and Capacity Issues
Sometimes slow quoting is the result of structural issues inside the company.
Maybe you have only one person who is trained to quote a certain category of work. Maybe approvals always sit with someone who is overloaded. Maybe communication between teams is slow or unclear. Maybe nobody is reviewing win rates or quote accuracy, so the process never improves.
These are not individual performance issues. They are system design issues. You fix them by spreading quoting capability across more people, simplifying approvals, improving handoffs, and setting up better communication loops between sales and operations.
7. No Tiered Quoting Approach
Not every quote deserves the same level of effort. But many companies treat every opportunity like a complex, custom request.
A $2,500 repeat job should not need the same engineering review as a $250,000 custom system. When everything gets full treatment, your team slows to the pace of its most complex work.
Create a tiered quoting system. Quick quotes for small, simple, or repeat work. Standard quotes for typical projects. Complex quotes for large or unique opportunities. Define the information required, who gets involved, and how long each tier should take.
Bringing It All Together
Slow quoting isn’t about people not trying hard enough. Every team I’ve ever worked with is working hard. The real issue is that the system isn’t built to support speed. Once companies fix the intake, qualification, workflow, priorities, vendor dependencies, internal structure, and quoting tiers, speed becomes the natural outcome.
Download the Quoting Velocity Diagnostic Checklist
If you want a simple way to identify where quoting gets stuck in your organization, I put together a one-page checklist you can use with your team.
It covers intake, qualification, workflow issues, vendor delays, prioritization, and more.
👉 Download the checklist here
If quoting delays are costing you deals or creating internal friction, I can help you map the system, find the bottlenecks, and build a smoother path from request to proposal.
Just let me know and we can walk through what your current quoting flow looks like.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Most delays come from poor intake, weak qualification, manual internal processes, unclear priorities, and waiting on vendors. It’s rarely about people not working hard enough. It’s usually the system they’re working inside.
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It depends on the complexity of the work, but most companies can turn standard quotes in 24 to 72 hours with the right structure in place. Complex quotes might take longer, but even those should have a clear timeline and owner.
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Engineering should get involved when technical risk, customization, or assumptions directly affect cost or feasibility. If the deal is simple, repeatable, or low value, a quick-quote path should handle it without pulling engineers into unnecessary work.
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Define what information you actually need at the quoting stage and build a clean intake form. Most companies ask too many design-level questions too early. Focus on the critical details needed to price the work and save the rest for after the PO during design signoff.
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Better targeting, better discovery, and clearer qualification criteria. When leads are aligned with your capabilities and sales is asking the right questions early, you avoid quoting low-value projects or opportunities that won’t go anywhere.
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Improve the quality of the RFQs you send them, build relationships that encourage faster responses, use any self-service tools they offer, or create internal cost models that let you estimate without waiting. If a vendor slows you down consistently, it may be time to look for a different partner.
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Standardize your templates, pricing logic, and estimating assumptions. Build a single source of truth for costs. The goal is to make quoting repeatable so it doesn’t rely on one or two people who “know how to price it.”
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You categorize quotes into levels based on complexity. Quick quotes are fast and simple. Standard quotes require more detail. Complex quotes involve engineering and deeper analysis. Each tier has its own requirements, timeline, and approval path. This keeps you from treating every opportunity like a custom project.
