Some Schedule contracts may one-day not have
contract-level pricing due to a move initiated by the
General Services Administration recently that may culminate in the agency using
authority given to it by Congress as part of the FY’19 Defense Authorization
Act to establish Schedule contracts that leave price discussions to contractors
and their customers. The recent issuance of an Advanced Notice of Proposed
Rulemaking (ANPR) is the first step in setting up a possible pilot
project. The ANPR asks for comments on a
host of issues, including whether task order type makes a difference, the type
and breadth of professional services that could be part of the program, potential
GSAR changes, and more. The concept of a
non-priced GSA Schedule contract has been discussed for nearly 30 years. It would potentially eliminate the Schedules
Price Reduction Clause as well as hourly labor rates now listed for an
array of professional services.
While this initiative is likely
to be popular with industry, contractors and GSA may have to work with
customer agencies to provide assurance that Schedule contracts still offer a
streamlined acquisition process and competitive pricing at the task order level. Comments on the ANPR are due to GSA September
18th. Companies are
strongly encouraged to comment.
See the link here for the ANPR, what GSA is asking for comments on, and
how to submit comments: https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2020/08/19/2020-16681/general-services-administration-acquisition-regulation-gsar-increasing-order-level-competition-for
In this stressful time it seems like everyone could
use a sanity check. This could even
apply to your contracts. Allen Federal
is happy to review your commercial item contracts and task orders to make sure
they say what you think they do and to recommend changes if they don’t. Our 30 years of experience has proven that
even experienced firms benefit from an outside set of eyes now and then. Contact us today at info@allenfederal.com
and we’ll set up a review that fits your needs at a competitive price.
Federal agencies could spend as much as $630 billion in discretionary
money in FY’20, up over $30 billion from the record-breaking performance of
FY’19. Discretionary spending includes
the acquisition of commercial services, products, and solutions. Almost $200 billion of the total figure had
yet to be obligated as of August 5th, according to research from
Bloomberg Government. NextGov reports,
“(t)he government’s discretionary spending has increased significantly
since 2015, driven largely by the Defense Department.
Discretionary spending at the Army, Navy and Air Force each jumped
approximately 10% in fiscal 2019.” In
addition, Bloomberg expects a significant uptick in IT and telecom spending,
particularly in such areas as networking capacity, bandwidth and telework
services. Bloomberg previously reported that professional services and IT
spending, in that order, would be among the two highest spend areas. All of this adds up to unprecedented
opportunities for contractors. There
should be multiple opportunities for well-prepared contractors to create new
business. Adding money onto existing
projects could be a potential discussion topic with current clients as
well. It wasn’t that long ago that
discretionary spending dipped under the $500 billion mark. It will almost certainly contract in future
years. Locking in business now is
essential to long-term success.
FY’21 is also likely to operate under a CR until at least December. Close business now and rest when the leaves
turn.
The Department of Defense needs help in
managing its IT portfolio and can improve its
transparency and risk management.
NASA, Transportation, and Treasury also need help in that area. These are among the findings of the
recently-published 10th FITARA report card (https://federalnewsnetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/fitara-Scorecard-10-USAID-corrected.pdf). Once viewed unevenly across the federal IT
community, FITARA compliance is now mandated by OMB and is the subject of
regular Congressional oversight.
Contractors probably know that, as a result, FITARA comes up a lot more
in business and agency management discussions than was once the case. While federal agencies are making
overall progress in meeting their FITARA requirements, there are still specific
areas where companies can help. One such
area is “Agency CIO Authority Enhancements”. DOD, DHS, and NASA are three agencies that
received an “F” in that category, indicating that they might be open to help
from contractors that can provide a strategic analysis of the CIO’s
role and how it is integrated into overall agency management. To put it mildly, not all CIO designations
carry the same weight. Where are
agencies doing well? Both GSA and USAID
received an overall “A” grade. All
agencies except OPM received an “A” grade for their management of software
licensing. Still, there is plenty
of intelligence to be gathered from the latest report card on where agencies
fall short in IT management and, by extension, where contractors might be able
to find opportunities.
The busy federal buying season also
corresponds with an increase in acquisition-related protests. Protests are a fact of life in government
procurement and we believe that companies do themselves a great disservice if
they adopt “no protest” policies.
Indeed, we are happy to have a deeper discussion on why outside of the
newsletter. Before a company
protests, though, it is absolutely essential to know the answer to this
question: “What do I want to happen?”.
This may seem obvious, but consider just the latest example of where it
wasn’t. It’s a safe bet that none
of the small businesses that had invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in
Alliant II SB wanted the procurement to be cancelled. Staff time, proposal writers, business
consultants, lawyers, etc. all were deployed with the expectation that there
would be business through Alliant II SB.
Back in the dark ages we had the chance to sit in on oral arguments
before the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, sometimes known as the
“junior Supreme Court”, on the Best Power contract case. The lawyer for Best was prepared for
everything related to the contract. He
was not prepared for the question from one of the judges, “What is it that you
want?” The lawyer stammered. There was an awkward silence. Finally, the judge answered his own question,
“Do you want attorney’s fees?”. A perceptible groan came from the gallery
as the lawyer quietly affirmed that, yes, he would like fees. Not one of the best moments from the annals
of federal contract law and, unsurprisingly, the Court found a way to punt on
the case. The bottom line is that it
is ok to protest when you have a legitimate reason to do so, but you need to
answer the “What do I want?” question first. Losing your investment in a huge IDIQ
contract and ensuring that your lawyer gets paid probably aren’t at the top of
the list.