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Reminder: Selected federal acquisition thresholds change today

As we first informed you on July 8, some of the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) dollar thresholds change effective October 1, 2015.

The inflationary adjustments to the thresholds are summarized below, inluding references to the applicable FAR parts:

  • FARThe micro-purchase threshold of $3,000 increases to $3,500 (FAR 2.101).
  • The threshold for use of simplified acquisition procedures for acquisition of commercial items increases from $6.5 million to $7 million (FAR 13.500).
  • The cost or pricing data threshold (FAR 15.403-4) and the  Cost Accounting Standards threshold (FAR 30.201-4 and FAR clause 52.230-5) increases from $700,000 to $750,000.
  • The prime contractor subcontracting plan floor increases from $650,000 to $700,000.  The subcontracting plan threshold for construction contracts remains the same at $1.5 million (FAR 19.702).
  • The threshold for reporting first-tier subcontract information, including executive compensation, increases from $25,000 to $30,000 (FAR Subpart 4.14 and FAR clause 52.204-10).
  • The threshold for including the clause requiring contractors to provide equal employment opportunities to veterans increases from $100,000 to $150,000 (FAR 22.1303 and FAR clause 52.222-35).
  • The threshold requiring contractors to flowdown the clause regarding a contractor’s Code of Business Ethics and Conduct increases from $5 million to $5.5 million (FAR clause 52.203-15).
  • The threshold restricting subcontracts with a contractor that has been debarred, suspended, or proposed for debarment increases from $30,000 to $35,000 (FAR 9.409 and FAR clause 52.209-6).

Other FAR-prescribed dollar thresholds do not change at this time.  For instance, the simplified acquisition threshold of $150,000 (FAR 2.101) remains unchanged, and FedBizOpps preaward and postaward notices (FAR Parts 5.101 and 5.301) remain at $25,000..

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F-35’s operating cost to decline, says DoD acquisition chief

The Pentagon will decrease its $1.1 trillion estimate for the cost of supporting Lockheed Martin Corp. (LMT)’s F-35 fighter jet over a 55-year lifespan, the top U.S. weapons buyer said.

“It will drop to a number that’s not trivial but is not as much” a reduction “as I would like,” Frank Kendall, the Defense Department’s undersecretary for acquisition, said April 3, 2014 at a Bloomberg Government breakfast in Washington.

While debate over the aircraft, the costliest U.S. weapons system, has focused mostly on the price to develop and build the fighter, Pentagon agencies also have disputed its long-term operating costs, from spare parts to repairs.

Kendall declined to elaborate on the reduced 55-year estimate by the department’s independent cost-assessment office. The figure will be released later this month in its next unclassified Selected Acquisition Report. Until then, the official projection is the $1.1 trillion formulated by that office three years ago.

By contrast, the Pentagon’s F-35 program office estimates that the fleet will cost $857 billion to operate and support over its lifetime.

On the separate cost of developing and producing a planned fleet of 2,443 F-35s, the U.S. Government Accountability Office said in February that its projection is $390.4 billion, as adjusted for inflation over the years the plane is produced. The Pentagon’s latest estimate by the same measure is $391.2 billion, about a 1.1 percent reduction from an earlier calculation.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-04-03/lockheed-f-35-s-operating-cost-estimate-to-decline.html 

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