Start from the work, not the vehicle
A request for four 4x4 vehicles with drivers for six months invites four different interpretations. One supplier prices a vehicle parked in Kabul and driven on demand; another prices a vehicle stationed in a province with its driver living nearby; a third assumes daytime city driving; a fourth assumes long interprovincial trips with overnight stays. All four quotations are honest, and none of them can be compared with the others.
The remedy is to describe the work the vehicles will do. Where does each team start the day, and where does it go? How many people travel, carrying what equipment? Are the trips inside a city, between districts or between provinces? Does the team stay overnight in the field, and does the driver stay with it? A supplier who knows the pattern can price the vehicle class, the driver arrangement and the fuel realistically, and can say honestly where it cannot.
The pattern also decides which vehicle is right. The Logistics Cluster's road network assessment (opens in a new tab) records that many unpaved rural roads become impassable in heavy rain or winter months, which is where a 4x4 earns its cost; on a paved corridor a van may carry an enumeration team more efficiently than two pickups.
What should the request for quotation specify?
These are the items that most often decide whether quotations can be compared, and whether the deployment runs as planned once it starts.
Vehicle class and condition
4x4, pickup or van; seating and load space; and any age or condition requirement your organisation applies, stated rather than implied, with how it will be checked at handover.
Geography and routes
Base locations, provinces and districts, typical daily routes, and whether interprovincial or overnight travel is expected.
Working pattern
Days per week, hours, on-call expectations, and how Fridays and public holidays are handled.
Drivers
Licence category, experience on the routes, languages, conduct requirements, and whether a driver stays with the vehicle overnight.
Duration and flexibility
Start date, minimum period, and the notice needed to add a vehicle or release one early.
Fuel, maintenance and distance
Who pays for fuel and how it is recorded, and whether there are distance limits — the terms behind most invoice disputes.
Replacement and downtime
What happens when a vehicle breaks down or a driver is absent, the replacement you expect, and how downtime is treated on the invoice.
Liability for loss and damage
Who bears it, written into the contract. The Logistics Cluster reports that insurance services, including vehicle insurance, were suspended in March 2022, so check the current position rather than assuming cover exists.
Records
Trip logs, fuel records and the usage report you need for your own reconciliation and donor reporting.
Conduct, safeguarding and security belong in the request
A driver is often the programme's most visible representative in a community, and on many deployments the person who spends most time with field staff and beneficiaries. Conduct requirements belong in the request, not in an induction after award: the code of conduct drivers must sign, the PSEA briefing they must receive, and how a complaint about a driver is raised and handled.
Security arrangements belong there too. State whether movements must be reported to your security focal point, whether any routes are off limits, and who has authority to stop a trip. A supplier with regional teams should then be able to show how that decision is taken locally. At Zhikal, routes and field risk are assessed before deployment, the go/no-go decision is held at zone level, and access or security disruptions are reported to the client within 24 hours with a proposed alternative.
Compare quotations on what they include
Once the specification is fixed, ask every supplier to price against it in the same format: vehicle cost, driver cost, fuel basis, overnight allowances, and what is excluded. A lower daily rate that leaves out fuel or overnight costs is not cheaper; it moves the cost onto the invoice.
The worksheet below does that arithmetic. Enter the deployment once — vehicles, months, the distance each vehicle drives, nights in the field and driver overtime — then each quotation as its price schedule states it. It adds back whatever a quotation leaves out and sets them side by side as one all-in monthly cost per vehicle. Its opening figures are invented to show the effect: the lowest headline rate turns out to be the most expensive.
Worksheet · works in your browser, nothing is sent
Compare vehicle-rental quotations
The figures it opens with are an invented example in no particular currency, not market rates or Zhikal's prices. Replace them with your deployment and the quotations you received.
3. All in, side by side
Lowest quoted rate: Supplier C. Lowest all-in cost: Supplier A, once the driver, fuel, distance, nights and overtime are in.
| Cost | Supplier ALowest all-in | Supplier B | Supplier C |
|---|---|---|---|
| Quoted monthly rate | 1,800 | 2,300 | 1,500 |
| + driver | 0 | 0 | 450 |
| + fuel | 462 | 0 | 462 |
| + distance over the limit | 0 | 0 | 150 |
| + overnight allowances | 100 | 80 | 120 |
| + overtime | 50 | 40 | 60 |
| All-in, per vehicle per month | 2,412 | 2,420 | 2,742 |
| For the whole deployment | 57,888 | 58,080 | 65,808 |
| Per km driven | 0.80 | 0.81 | 0.91 |
| Replacement promised within | 24 h | 48 h | 72 h |
Price is one line of the evaluation. Weigh it against the replacement time, the records each supplier will keep, liability for loss and damage, and references you can call.
Ask for evidence rather than assurances. Registration and tax documents, references for comparable deployments that can actually be called, and an account of how a recent multi-province deployment was coordinated say more than a fleet list. As a point of comparison, on Zhikal's largest deployment a rental fleet was deployed and coordinated across all 34 provinces for more than seven months in support of an education-supply survey, with regional coordinators managing driver rotation, fuel, maintenance and route changes as access conditions shifted.
A request for quotation you can adapt
The template below turns the items above into a form every supplier answers in the same way, with a price schedule whose lines match the worksheet, and the evaluation criteria stated before quotations arrive. Print it, or take it into Word and add your organisation's own terms. Leave the weights for your procurement committee to set; state them in the request.
Request for quotation: vehicle rental with drivers
Completed by the requesting organisation and sent to every supplier in the same form.
The request
Requesting organisation
ContactName, role, email and telephone
Reference and date
Quotations dueDate, time and how to submit
The work the vehicles will do
Base locationsWhere each vehicle starts the day
Provinces and districts
Typical routesCity, between districts, between provinces
Overnight travelExpected? How often? Does the driver stay?
Passengers and equipmentPer vehicle
Working patternDays, hours, on-call, Fridays and holidays
Vehicles
| Vehicle class | Number | Seats | Condition or age required | Start date | Minimum period |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Drivers
Licence category
Experience and languages
- Code of conduct signed before deployment
PSEA briefing before deployment, and how a complaint about a driver is raised
Movements reported to the security focal point, and who may stop a trip
Fuel, distance, maintenance and records
FuelIncluded in the rate, or paid by the client against records
DistanceLimit per month and the charge beyond it
Maintenance and repairsBy the supplier, at whose cost
RecordsTrip logs, fuel records, usage report; how often
Replacement and liability
Vehicle replaced withinHours after a breakdown
Absent driver replaced within
Downtime on the invoiceHow a day without a vehicle is charged
Liability for loss and damageWho bears it; the current insurance position
Price schedule (the supplier completes)
| Line | Unit | Rate | Included in the vehicle rate? | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vehicle with driver | ||||
| Driver, if not included | ||||
| Fuel | ||||
| Distance beyond the monthly limit | ||||
| Overnight allowance | ||||
| Driver overtime | ||||
| Mobilisation to a province | ||||
| Anything else charged |
Evaluation, stated in advance
| Criterion | Weight % | Supplier A | Supplier B | Supplier C |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Meets the specification (pass or fail) | ||||
| All-in price for the deployment | ||||
| Replacement time and backup vehicles | ||||
| Presence in the provinces named | ||||
| References for comparable deployments | ||||
| Records and reporting |
Attach with the quotation
- Business licence and tax identification number
- Two references for comparable deployments, with contacts
- Registration documents for the vehicles offered
- The supplier's code of conduct for drivers
Supplier's declaration
Supplier
Authorised signatory
Signature and date
Quotation valid until
When one supplier should hold the whole deployment
Splitting a multi-province deployment across local vendors can look cheaper per vehicle, but it moves the coordination onto the programme: several contracts, several invoice formats, and nobody accountable when a vehicle in one province stops. A single supplier with coordinators in each zone gives one escalation line and one set of records, which matters most on surveys and monitoring rounds, where a stranded team loses days.
Where the need is goods rather than people, the service is a different one: see road transport and freight and the road transport planning guide. For project vehicles with drivers, Zhikal's vehicle rental service sets out vehicle classes, coverage and how deployments run.
Sources
- 2.3 Afghanistan Road Network (opens in a new tab)
Logistics Cluster, Logistics Capacity Assessment. Road conditions by region, including roads that lose access in winter or take only light trucks.
- 3.2 Afghanistan Transporters (opens in a new tab)
Logistics Cluster, Logistics Capacity Assessment. How the domestic trucking market, transport slips and tariffs work, and the 2022 suspension of insurance services.
External sources are cited for the facts they report and were checked when this guide was last updated. Citing them implies no relationship with, or endorsement by, their publishers.