Government Contracting Blog

As a modern business, you are probably aware of the importance of web presence. You likely wouldn’t allow your own website to have outdated information, omit key information, or lack photos. However, sometimes product contractors under the GSA Schedule are not as well versed in how to ensure that their web presence in GSA meets the same standards. GSA has several procurement platforms to help contractors list their solutions and bid on contracting opportunities, but the most important site for selling products is GSA Advantage!.

You may not love them as a federal contract holder, but regulations are an important part of federal government contracting. If you are not familiar with the Price Reductions Clause, now is the time to get educated if you want to avoid potentially costly consequences down the line. GSA Schedule holders can be divided into two categories, those who fall under Transactional Data Reporting (TDR) and those who are required to submit Commercial Sales Practice (CSP) information. If you need help figuring out which category you fall under, determine whether you report your GSA sales monthly or quarterly.

As most contractors know, or will find out, maintaining compliance is one of the most important factors in doing business with the government. One of the most important, and frustrating, aspects of compliance for GSA Schedule holders is the tracking of Commercial Sales Practices (CSP). The idea of disclosing your Commercial Sales Practices, and tracking to make sure that their relationship to GSA pricing are not disturbed, can be daunting to many GSA Schedule holders and prospective contractors.

As a current or prospective federal contractor, you are likely already aware that the federal government is the largest volume purchaser of goods and services in the world. However, while the federal government purchases large volumes, that does not mean every single purchase they make is itself large. Smaller purchases are often made, which helps explain why the government created less cumbersome ordering procedures for transactions under certain dollar thresholds.

In 2016, the General Services Administration (GSA) rolled out a program that allows Transactional Data Reporting (TDR) on GSA Schedule orders for contractors who opt in (and are eligible). As TDR has become more established in the GSA Schedules program, more and more contractors have been opting into TDR and are experiencing the benefits it provides. Now that GSA has expanded TDR to an additional 67 Special Item Numbers (SINs), I would like to help you make an informed decision regarding whether or not you should opt into TDR by providing an overview of both the benefits and potential drawbacks of switching to TDR. Let’s jump into finding how switching to TDR would affect maintenance of your GSA Schedule.

Once you have received your GSA Schedule contract, remaining compliant with its requirements is the most important part to becoming a successful contractor. Non-compliance can lead to the removal of products from your GSA Schedule, resulting in loss of business opportunities and revenue. One aspect of non-compliance that isn’t discussed enough is GSA runs an automated process that helps streamline the removal of non-compliant products from GSA Multiple Award Schedule (MAS) contracts. You often will not even get notification before the items are removed in this automatic “RoboMod” process. In some cases, the item might not actually have anything wrong with it, there could just be an error with some of the information you listed, such as an incorrect Country of Origin (COO).