Government Contracting Blog

As the nation battles the coronavirus pandemic, the government has stepped in and spending has risen at the federal, local, and state levels. Always one of the government’s primary procurement vehicles, the GSA Schedule contracts become especially important during national emergencies because of the Disaster Recovery purchasing which can be added to contracts.

If you’ve made the decision to pursue a GSA Schedule, the first choice you will need to make is whether to go it alone or hire a GSA consultant to help. At first, the answer might seem easy – you’ve been selling to the government for years, why would you pay someone to tell you how to do it? Unfortunately it’s not that simple and every company, regardless of size, should seriously consider hiring an outside consultant before managing the process in-house.

What is a Contractor Team Arrangement? GSA defines a GSA Schedule Contractor Team Arrangement (CTA) as an arrangement in which two or more GSA schedule contractors team together to provide a total solution to meet a customer’s needs. The Schedules CTA does not create a separate legal entity, but allows Schedule contractors to meet buyer requirements by combining the supplies and/or services from each team member’s separate Schedule contract in response to a buyer’s Request for Quote (RFQ). CTAs are different from Prime/Subcontracting Agreements - more information about that here.  It is important to note that Schedule CTA’s are different from FAR 9.6 Contractor Team Arrangements; Schedule CTAs require both participants to have a GSA Multiple Award Schedule Contract.

Along with the cancellation of a contract, Suspension and Debarment are the primary ways GSA punishes vendors who fail to comply with their contract terms. But understanding what exactly Suspension and Debarment are and how to avoid them can be complicated.

The Dun & Bradstreet D-U-N-S number has long been the GSA’s official Unique Entity Identifier, but it is being replaced in December 2020. In its place will be a new Unique Entity ID, generated in the System for Award Management (SAM.gov). This new, as yet unnamed Unique Entity Identifier will be twelve characters long. The definition of uniqueness will not be changing. Uniqueness will continue to be based on an entity being a separate legal entity and/or associated with a separate physical address.

On October 1st 2019, GSA will be consolidating its Multiple Award Schedules (MAS). The consolidation will combine 24 of the current schedules into 1, excluding only the 9 Department of Veteran Affairs (VA) schedules. On August 20th GSA held a webinar to explain the process of consolidation and answer vendor questions. The consolidation will consist of three phases.