Choosing the Right RMC Starts Long Before the RFP Goes Out

If your RMC contract is coming up for renewal, or you're building a program from scratch, it can be easy to treat the RFP as the starting line. It's not. That's the premise behind a new piece from Plus Relocation, Setting the Table: How to Ensure the Right RMCs Are Included in Your RFP Process, a useful gut-check for any mobility or procurement leader mapping out a provider search.

Before You RFP: Is a Full Process Even the Right Call?

Not every problem needs a market-wide RFP. A full process is a serious undertaking, typically 7 to 9 months and dozens of internal hours across a dozen-plus stakeholders, so it deserves the same "know your why" discipline as building the shortlist itself. A lighter-weight approach may serve better when:

• The issue is narrow and fixable. A recurring service or invoicing problem with an otherwise solid incumbent is often better solved through a direct conversation and a performance improvement plan.
• Scope doesn't justify the lift. A small or early-stage program may not have enough at stake to warrant the hours a full cycle demands.
• You're growing fast and haven't outsourced yet. A company scaling quickly and still managing relocation in-house often can't spare a 7-to-9 month runway. Moving straight to evaluating a small number of well-regarded providers gets support in place without stalling growth.
• You have strong, trusted consensus. When peers, an advisor, or your industry network point consistently to the same one or two providers, that's real due diligence in its own right. A lighter-touch review (reference calls, a proposal from just those providers, a demo) can validate the fit without opening a wide competitive field.
• You went to market recently. A performing incumbent and a recent RFP may mean renegotiating at renewal delivers most of the benefit without the disruption of a transition.

The goal is matching the process to the problem, not running every situation through the same playbook. A full RFP is a tool, not a default, so use it when the situation actually calls for it. Being deliberate about that choice is the first real decision in a smart RFP process.

A few ideas worth sitting with when you do decide to move forward on an RFP:

• Define your "why" before your questions. Program goals, volume, geography, and tech requirements should shape your shortlist, not the other way around.
• Use an RFI to narrow the field. 15–20 targeted questions separate providers worth a full evaluation from those that aren't a fit, before anyone invests in a formal RFP response.
• Fees are a small piece of the picture. Service fees are a fraction of total mobility costs. The bigger opportunity is evaluating how well a provider manages the larger spend: policy design, exception trends, supplier leverage, and add-ons like tax or payroll coordination.
• Give it room to breathe. 12 to 18 months before contract expiration is the recommended runway. Gartner puts the average B2B buying group at around 11 people, and mobility is no exception: legal, finance, HR business partners, IT, and payroll often join mobility and procurement at the table, and that runway is what gives them room to weigh in before the formal process starts.

The math behind "fees are a small piece of the picture"

Across a typical assignment, RMC service fees run roughly 1–2% of total program spend — the other 98% goes to taxes, housing costs, allowances, corporate apartments and household goods, largely as pass-through costs. Negotiating fees alone rarely produces the savings finance teams hope for; real cost containment tends to come from the program side instead: alternative policy structures (core-flex, lump sum, tiered approaches), IRS-approved home sale programs, supplier rebates, and regular review of exception spend. It also helps to understand how RMCs earn revenue: domestic revenue leans on real estate referral fees, while international revenue depends more on direct service fees — a dynamic worth reading more on in the companion piece, Understanding RMC Pricing: What Buyers Need to Know.

Once goals and stakeholders are aligned and a full process is confirmed as the right call, an RFI is where the real narrowing happens: global footprint, financial stability, technology and reporting, data protection, and employee-experience focus are all worth weighing. Tailoring questions and pricing sheets to your program's specifics, rather than recycling a generic template, pays off when it's time to compare finalists apples-to-apples.

These resources make a solid pre-read for anyone weighing a renewal or a first-time search, and a reminder that the smartest RFP is one you're confident you actually need.

Not sure where to start? Plus can help define program goals, build a focused shortlist, and structure an RFP that makes true comparisons easy.