FAQ

General

What is Strutter?

Strutter is an AI-powered RFP management platform built for the buying side of procurement. It helps organizations create RFPs with AI, invite vendors, collect responses, auto-score submissions, compare candidates side by side, and select winners. Vendors get a dedicated portal to respond to RFPs with AI-assisted drafting.

Unlike most RFP software (Responsive, Loopio, AutoRFP, DeepRFP), which helps vendors write responses, Strutter is purpose-built for the organizations that issue RFPs and evaluate vendors.

Who is Strutter for?

Strutter serves two audiences:

• RFP issuers (buyers). Procurement teams, project managers, IT leaders, and anyone who needs to evaluate vendors through a structured RFP process. Strutter is designed for mid-market organizations (50 to 500 employees) running 1 to 10 RFPs per year.
• Vendors (responders). Companies that respond to RFPs and want a faster, more organized way to submit proposals with AI-assisted drafting.

Do I need separate accounts for issuing and responding?

No. During onboarding, choose "Both" to enable both the RFP management dashboard and the vendor portal from a single account. You can also enable the vendor portal later from your settings.

Accounts and access

How do I sign up?

Go to rfp.strutterai.com and click Sign Up. You can sign in with your email address or Google account.

Do vendors need a Strutter account?

Not to view an RFP. Vendors receive a secure link by email and can review the full RFP without creating an account. They only need to sign up when they're ready to submit a response.

How many team members can I add?

Team size limits vary by plan. See plans and pricing for details.

What happens when someone leaves my team?

Remove them from the Team page. Their access is revoked immediately. Any RFPs or data they contributed remains in your organization.

RFPs

How many RFPs can I create?

Your plan determines your RFP limit. Limits reset on a regular cycle based on your plan. See plans and pricing for your plan's limits.

Can I edit an RFP after publishing?

Yes. You can edit the title, description, questions, sections, and weights while the RFP is in Open status. Changes take effect immediately for vendors who haven't submitted yet.

Can I re-open a closed RFP?

Yes, as long as it hasn't been awarded. Change the status back to Open to accept new vendor submissions.

Can I delete an RFP?

Yes, except for awarded RFPs. Awarded RFPs are protected to preserve your procurement history. To delete, open the RFP detail page and click Delete, then confirm in the dialog.

What question types are available?

Strutter supports Rich Text, Number, Date, Table, Slider, Single Select, Multi Select, and File Upload. Each type has its own input control and is scored by the AI according to the question's requirements.

AI and scoring

How does AI scoring work?

When a vendor submits their response, each answer is automatically scored on a 1 to 5 scale based on how well it meets the question's requirements. Scores appear on the review dashboard immediately.

Can I override AI scores?

Yes, on select plans. Click any score badge to replace it with your own rating. Your manual score is used in all calculations, including overall rankings and AI recommendations. See plans and pricing for details.

What are AI credits?

AI credits are consumed when you use AI-powered features: scoring responses, getting recommendations, using the prompt bar, and Strutter Assist. RFP generation counts against your plan's RFP limit, not AI credits. Each plan includes a credit allocation. See plans and pricing for credit details.

What happens when I run out of AI credits?

AI features are temporarily unavailable until the next reset cycle. You can also upgrade your plan for a larger allocation. See plans and pricing for details.

How does the AI recommendation work?

Click Get Recommendation on the review dashboard. The AI compares all submitted responses, identifies strengths and weaknesses, and recommends a vendor. If no vendor scores above 3.0, you'll receive a "no strong candidates" advisory instead.

Vendors

How do vendor invitations work?

From any open RFP, click Invite Vendors and search by name, company, or email. Each vendor receives an email with a unique, secure link. They can view the RFP immediately and sign in when ready to respond.

Can vendors edit their response after submitting?

No. Once a vendor clicks Submit, their response is locked. This ensures scoring is based on the final submission.

What is the Q&A Library?

The Q&A Library is a collection of reusable question-and-answer pairs that vendors build over time. When responding to an RFP, matching past answers are suggested automatically, saving time on common topics. It's available in the vendor portal.

What is Strutter Assist?

Strutter Assist is an AI drafting tool for vendors. It suggests response text based on the question context, company profile, and Q&A Library. Available on select plans, it uses your plan's AI credits. See plans and pricing for details.

Billing

What plans are available?

Strutter offers multiple plan tiers, from a free option to enterprise. See plans and pricing for current plan details and feature comparisons.

How does billing work?

Paid plans are billed monthly through Stripe. You can upgrade, downgrade, or cancel from Settings at any time. Upgrades take effect immediately; downgrades apply at the end of the billing period.

What happens if I cancel?

Your account reverts to the Free plan at the end of the current billing period. All your data is preserved, but feature access returns to Free tier limits.

Do unused credits roll over?

No. AI credits and RFP limits reset on a regular cycle based on your plan. Unused allocations do not carry forward. See plans and pricing for reset schedules.

API

Who can access the API?

API access is available on select plans. Only admin users can create and manage API keys. See plans and pricing for eligibility and API access for setup instructions and endpoint documentation.

What can I do with the API?

The API lets you list RFPs, fetch RFP details and questions, retrieve vendor responses with scores, and browse your vendor directory. All endpoints are read-only.

What are the rate limits?

60 requests per minute per API key. Exceeding the limit returns a 429 response.

Security

How are vendor invitation links secured?

Invitation links use secure, tokenized URLs. Raw tokens are never stored. Each link is unique to a specific vendor and RFP.

How are API keys stored?

API keys are securely hashed before storage. Strutter never stores your raw API key. You must copy the key when it's created, as it cannot be retrieved later.

Does Strutter store payment information?

No. All payment processing is handled by Stripe. Strutter does not store credit card numbers or other payment details.

Is there session timeout protection?

Yes. Users are warned after 30 minutes of inactivity and automatically signed out after 35 minutes. This protects your account from unauthorized access on shared devices.

AI RFP generation

What is an AI RFP generator?

An AI RFP generator is a tool that creates complete Request for Proposal documents from a plain-language description of your procurement need. Instead of writing an RFP from scratch in Word or using static templates, you describe what you need, answer a few clarifying questions, and the AI produces a structured RFP with sections, scored questions, weighted evaluation criteria, and vendor submission guidelines.

Strutter AI generates complete RFPs in under 60 seconds. See creating an RFP for the full walkthrough.

How is Strutter different from other AI RFP tools?

Most AI RFP tools (Responsive, Loopio, AutoRFP, DeepRFP) are built for the vendor side: they help companies write better responses to RFPs they receive. Strutter is built for the buyer side: it helps organizations create RFPs, invite vendors, score responses, and pick winners.

This means Strutter includes features no responder tool offers: AI RFP generation, automated response scoring with reasoning, AI vendor recommendations, a weighted comparison matrix, and a close-and-award workflow.

Does Strutter replace Word and Excel for RFP management?

Yes. Strutter replaces the manual process of writing RFPs in Word, tracking vendor responses in email, and scoring proposals in Excel. Everything lives in one platform: the RFP document, vendor invitations, response collection, scoring, comparison, and award decision.

Is there a free RFP tool I can use?

Yes. Strutter offers a free plan that includes AI auto-scoring, a comparison matrix, and an AI recommendation. No credit card required. See plans and pricing for what's included. Get started free.

Scoring and comparison

How does automated vendor scoring work?

When a vendor submits their response, Strutter AI scores every answer on a 1 to 5 scale based on how well it meets the question's requirements. Each score includes a written explanation of the AI's reasoning, so you can see exactly why a vendor received that rating. Scores factor in question weights to produce section averages and an overall vendor ranking. You can override any AI score with your own assessment on select plans.

What is an RFP comparison matrix?

A comparison matrix is a grid that shows every vendor's scores side by side, with questions as rows and vendors as columns. Strutter's built-in comparison matrix groups questions by section, shows weighted averages, and lets you click any score to expand the vendor's full response with AI reasoning. No spreadsheets needed.

How does the AI vendor recommendation work?

After vendors submit responses, click "Get Recommendation" and Strutter AI analyzes all submissions together. It identifies a recommended vendor with a rationale, lists strengths and weaknesses for each candidate, and provides a confidence assessment. If no vendor scores above 3.0 overall, Strutter returns a "no strong candidates" advisory instead of forcing a pick.

Strutter AI features

What is the Strutter AI Assistant?

The Strutter AI Assistant is a natural language prompt bar available on every page of the platform. Press Cmd+K (Mac) or Ctrl+K (Windows) to focus it. You can search RFPs, look up vendors, compare scores, create RFPs, invite vendors, send messages, and navigate the platform using plain language. See Strutter AI Assistant for the full guide.

What is AI self-review?

Before you publish an RFP, Strutter AI reviews it across eight categories: completeness, question quality, number of questions, industry relevance, fairness, specificity, structure, and scoring balance. You get a score from 1 to 10, specific findings grouped by severity, and suggested text fixes you can apply with one click. See AI features for details.

What are Strutter AI Suggestions?

Strutter AI Suggestions is an organizational memory feature. It learns from your past RFPs and, when you create a new one, suggests relevant questions, sections, and vendor performance data. Suggestions include relevance scores so you know how closely they match your current procurement. Available on select plans. See plans and pricing for details.

Does Strutter help vendors write responses?

Yes. The vendor portal includes Strutter Assist, which drafts response suggestions based on the question context and the vendor's company profile. Vendors who have responded to previous RFPs also receive automatic pre-fill suggestions with confidence levels. See vendor portal for details.