GSA | The Contracting Education Academy

September 20, 2019 By cs

How GSA is changing government buying

The General Services Administration (GSA) and its components manage a significant portfolio of the government’s spending, delivering the best value on goods and services for government, among other integral functions.

As GSA administrator and the commissioner of the Federal Acquisition Service, respectively, Emily Murphy and Alan Thomas have worked closely to spearhead a period of significant procurement reform, including combining the two-dozen multiple award schedules into one and experimenting with a government online shopping portal.

Federal Times sat down with Murphy and Thomas to discuss how the change has been a team effort and their vision for the future of the agency.

Read this interview at: https://www.federaltimes.com/acquisition/2019/09/12/acquiring-the-right-mindset-how-gsa-is-changing-government-buying/

September 18, 2019 By cs

HHS’s suspension of acquisition services leaves outside agencies and contractors in limbo

It’s been three months since the department announced it was closing down its shared services operations, and many questions remain unanswered.

The Health and Human Services Department’s decision to wind down its acquisition services for outside agencies has left customers scrambling to fill the void and a number of unanswered questions.

HHS announced in June that it would no longer offer assisted acquisition services for non-HHS customers through its Program Support Center, and gave them until Sept. 30, 2020, to find alternative providers. The center works for HHS and 19 other agencies on a fee-for-service basis, administering more than $1.4 billion in contracts per year, Federal News Network reported. Also, the department put four officials associated with the Program Support Center on paid leave between April and June, Bloomberg News reported.

“As the result of an internal review that is ongoing, [the Program Support Center] has determined that it does not have the policies, procedures, or internal controls necessary to conduct assisted acquisitions for agencies outside of HHS,” said Melissa McAbee, acting head of contracting at PSC, according to a report in Bloomberg News. As of mid-June, the center was managing 250 contracts for agencies besides HHS, including the Defense Department and Environmental Protection Agency.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.govexec.com/management/2019/09/hhss-suspension-acquisition-services-leaves-outside-agencies-and-contractors-limbo/159870/

September 9, 2019 By cs

The danger in GSA’s online marketplaces

A little commentary from the General Services Administration on our website urges government buyers to use the agency’s multiple-award schedule contracts.

The venerable MAS contracts generate about $45 billion in annual sales.

Over the years, GSA has continually tinkered with the awards schedules to keep the program relevant. Now it’s about to collapse the 24 individual schedules into one. GSA will release the new consolidated schedule and its terms and conditions on Oct. 1, with a goal of moving all vendors to one schedule by the end of fiscal 2020. GSA let industry know about the consolidated schedule plan late last year.

No change in federal procurement is ever simple.

Center Law Group’s Barbara Kinosky, whom I’ve interviewed from time to time, wrote this about the consolidation: “We understand modifications to add the new consolidated [special item numbers] will not be accepted after Sept. 30 until sometime in mid-January 2020 after contractors have accepted the mass modification incorporating the new consolidated schedule terms and conditions.”

See what I mean?

Once the conversion is done, buyers and sellers will, in theory, have a simpler, more uniform contracting system to deal with. The consolidation is one of many updates and improvements GSA is making to modernize the MAS and the supporting tools like e-modification.

Keep reading this article at: https://federalnewsnetwork.com/tom-temin-commentary/2019/08/the-danger-in-gsas-online-marketplaces/

August 28, 2019 By cs

GSA extends a pilot to save the government millions

The General Services Administration (GSA) decided to extend its Transaction Data Reporting (TDR) pilot through fiscal year 2020, a program GSA has said saves the government millions, according to a recent news release.

The TDR rule allowed GSA to remove “complex and burdensome” tracking and disclosure requirements mandated on contractors, in addition to asking contractors to electronically report specific procurement data, like prices paid, quantity and product description. The rule requires monthly reporting of transaction sales data from governmentwide contracts, which the GSA wrote increases transparency. GSA estimated when it made the initial announcement about the new rule in 2016 that it would save the government around $29 million a year.

“This rule also supports the government’s shift towards category management by centrally collecting and analyzing information on what federal agencies are buying and how much they are paying,” the GSA wrote in 2016. “This new transparency helps the government leverage its vast buying power and drives competition.”

Keep reading this article at: https://www.federaltimes.com/acquisition/gsa/2019/08/19/gsa-extends-a-pilot-to-save-the-government-millions/

August 22, 2019 By cs

A ban on Chinese tech is on the books — are feds ready?

Federal agencies have less than a week to update their upcoming and in-process contracts to include provisions that prohibit telecommunications equipment or services — or components of equipment or services — that are produced by Huawei Technologies Company, ZTE Corporation, Hytera Communications Corporation, Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology Company or Dahua Technology Company.

The interim rule added to the Federal Acquisition Regulation Aug. 7 by the Department of Defense, General Services Administration and NASA notified agencies that they have until Aug. 13 to update their acquisitions to reflect the prohibition of products that are produced by companies with suspected links to the Chinese government.

The rule change is not unexpected, as the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act initially codified the prohibition on such acquisitions, but the new rule formally implements such requirements for federal agencies.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.federaltimes.com/acquisition/2019/08/08/a-ban-on-chinese-tech-is-on-the-books-are-feds-ready

The General Services Administration (GSA) and its components manage a significant portfolio of the government’s spending, delivering the best value on goods and services for government, among other integral functions.

It’s been three months since the department announced it was closing down its shared services operations, and many questions remain unanswered.

A little commentary from the General Services Administration on our website urges government buyers to use the agency’s multiple-award schedule contracts.

The General Services Administration (GSA) decided to extend its Transaction Data Reporting (TDR) pilot through fiscal year 2020, a program GSA has said saves the government millions, according to a recent news release.

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