Material Price Update Agent

Material prices change monthly, and estimates built on old prices lose money. This agent checks the firm's price database for items older than set limits, refreshing volatile items such as steel or copper every 30 days. It drafts quote requests to suppliers, which the estimator sends, or reads published price indexes. When quotes come back, it checks they are within 10 percent of each other. If they are not, it asks for a third quote before using any of them, so one odd quote does not move every estimate. It updates prices only after the estimator approves. It also checks open estimates that use the updated items and shows how much each would change. Edge case: for long bids that include volatile items, it suggests adding an escalation clause so the firm is not locked into today's price.