What is simplified acquisition?
Simplified acquisition is a contracting method which seeks to reduce the amount of work the government must undertake to evaluate an offer. When choosing a vendor in a simplified acquisition procurement, agencies need not bother with formal evaluation plans, establishing a competitive range, conducting discussions or scoring offers. Also, a contracting officer, not necessarily a source selection team, can choose the contract winner. Other contracting methods include sealed bidding and negotiated procurement.
What is the simplified acquisition threshold?
Because source selection is less arduous under simplified acquisition, the dollar value of contracts allowable under simplified acquisition theoretically is capped at $250,000 (per Section 805 of the FY18 National Defense Authorization Act). But, under a pilot program that the government keeps extending incrementally (it’s been in place since at least 1997), simplified acquisition procedures can be used in procurements worth up to $7 million (or $13 million when the acquisition is for commercial items that are to be used in support of a contingency operation or to facilitate the defense against or recovery from nuclear, biological, chemical, or radiological attack), provided that a contracting officer “reasonably expects,” based on market research, that offers will include only commercial items not worth more than that.
What’s the difference between the simplified acquisition threshold and the simplified acquisition procedure?
The distinction between procurements made through simplified acquisition procedure versus procurements under the threshold mainly matters because procurements above the threshold done with the procedure might be subject to scrutiny that acquisitions made under the threshold aren’t. For example, contracting officers must check a database called the Federal Awardee Performance and Integrity Information System (FAPIIS) for any procurement worth more than the threshold, but not for procurements worth less.
Agencies also must conduct market research before releasing a solicitation for anything worth more than the simplified acquisition threshold.
Contracting officers must also require companies submitting a response to a request for quote under simplified acquisition procedures to certify that their prices are independently determined.
Are responses to a request for quotation made under simplified acquisition procedures binding?
Nope. Unlike responses to a request for proposal, quotes are purely informational. Transactions made under simplified acquisition procedures (above and below the threshold) get legally binding only when the companies accept an offer the government makes based on a quote. Companies can only accept or reject federal offers.
That means that should a company submit a quote but claim that it’s a limited time discount, there’s no reason for a contracting officer to behave as if the quote is actually time-limited; if the government offers to buy at the quoted price even after the supposed expiration of the price, companies are in a position to only accept or reject the offer.
Unless a RFQ specifically prohibits it, companies can also freely update their quotes even after the due date for receipt of quotes because the original quote wasn’t legally binding.
Where are the rules governing simplified acquisition?
The simplified acquisition threshold is found in FAR Part 2. FAR Part 13 delineates the policies and procedures for the acquisition of supplies and services, including construction, research and development, and commercial items, the aggregate amount of which does not exceed the simplified acquisition threshold. Subpart 13.5 provides special authority for acquisitions of commercial items exceeding the simplified acquisition threshold but which do not exceed $7 million ($13 million for acquisitions as described in Subpart 13.500 (c)), including options. See Part 12 for policies applicable to the acquisition of commercial items exceeding the micro-purchase threshold. See Subpart 36.602-5 for simplified procedures to be used when acquiring architect-engineer services.
