Government Contracting Blog

At your 20 year mark? Say goodbye to a tedious proposal process! Congratulations on your successful partnership with the Government, under the GSA’s Federal Supply Schedules (FSS). Not all contractors make it to the 20-year mark with their GSA Schedules Contract and even less will extend the partnership past that. You’ve gotten this far, let’s talk about the process in detail, and what you can cut from your streamlined proposal. GSA allows for the award of overlapping or continuous contracts. These are identical contracts but with different periods of performance. Historically successful FSS contractors can acquire an overlapping contract to ensure contract continuity through what the GSA calls, a “streamlined process.” This applies to contractors that submit an offer for a new contract under the same schedule. Streamlined Offers are shortened by pulling a few of the most time-consuming things together. This includes the Open Ratings Report which can take up to 3 weeks for the surveys to complete and Past Project Write-ups.

GSA is making changes to become better aligned with the OPM Federal Human Capital Business Reference Model. The contracting vehicle's changes are in support of the government-wide Category Management goals to reduce contract redundancy, increase cost savings and to streamline the acquisition process. The updated 738 X Schedule complements the new, and more complex, Human Capital and Training Solutions (HCaTS) vehicle, by offering an A-La-Carte menu of specific services. The update also has provisions for time, material, labor hour contracts and traditional Firm Fixed Price service.

THE TIME IS NOW. You may or may not be aware that by submitting a proposal for a GSA Schedule 70 contract with the new GSA Cyber Security SINs (Penetration Testing, Incident Response, Cyber Hunt, and Risk & Vulnerability Assessments) it will take you on average 45 days to be awarded a schedule. In the commercial world this may sound like an ordinary time to award, but since we are dealing with the US Government, this is extremely expedited. The average time-to-award for a GSA Schedule 70 proposal including other SINs under the GSA’s IT Schedule 70 is 4-6 months.

On November 18th The General Services Administration (GSA) announced that the Schedule 70 solicitation has been updated to incorporate the Transactional Data Reporting pilot (TDR). This pilot program will affect thousands of Schedule 70 contractors under the following SINs: 132-8, 132-32, 132-33, 132-34, 132-54, and 132-55. For current Schedule 70 holders who have one of the impacted SINs it is important to note that contractors participation in this mass mod is optional. If you choose to decline the mod, you will opt out of the TDR pilot and continue with the Most Favored Customer (MFC) and Price Reduction Clause (PRC) System until it becomes a more formal requirement.