Category Archives: Contract Management

GSA Contract Pricing

Posted by editor on April 21st, 2009

A contractor has settled a lawsuit with the General Services Administration to the tune of $128 million dollars for not offering its lowest available pricing on a Federal Supply Service contract.

The contractor, California-based NetApp Inc., got into trouble under the False Claims Act, a “whistleblower” act that allows people not affiliated with the government to make claims on the government’s behalf. In this case, a former employee filed suit under the Act after senior managers reportedly ignored his findings that GSA was not given discounts available to commercial customers. The whistleblowing former employee will receive $19.2 million as part of the suit. Read more…

Small Businesses Can Compete for Economic Stimulus Contracts

Posted by editor on March 16th, 2009

A recent Wall Street Journal article, “Opportunity Knocks and Uncle Sam is at the Door,” discussed a current hot topic among small businesses: getting a piece of the $787 billion economic stimulus package. Since the federal government has a goal of awarding 23% of contracting dollars to small businesses each year, and state and local agencies have individual small business goals as well, the time is ripe for small businesses to start selling to the government. Read more…

Contract Management Week

Posted by Administrator on April 9th, 2008

The National Contract Management Association (NCMA) has declared the week of April 13 – 19, 2008 to be Contract Management Week. The NCMA announced Contract Management Week in an effort to recognize the thousands of hard-working individuals working on both the contracting and procurement sides of contract management. “Contract Management Week…will be a time dedicated to continued professional development, organizational focus, and personal recognition for the practice and practitioners of contract management,” said NCMA’s Board of Directors in a statement released July 28th of last year. Read more…

Business Ethics in Government Contracts

Posted by Administrator on February 5th, 2008

Ethics in Government Service

In December 2007, new FAR regulations were enacted requiring businesses performing certain contracts to have a written business code of ethics. All federal contracts over $5 million must now contain a clause requiring the contractors to have concrete ethics policies in place, as well as internal controls to maintain them, within 90 days of the contract award. The only exceptions to this rule are contracts for commercial items and those that will be performed outside of the United States. The new regulation also applies to subcontracts that are for over $5 million and that have a performance period of 120 days or longer. Read more…

Organizational Conflicts of Interest

Posted by Administrator on January 10th, 2008

In recent years, the Government Accountability Office has increased focus on organizational conflicts of interest with government contractors. Government contractors should keep a close eye on potential conflicts of interest. If the agency discovers an organizational conflict of interest (COI) that the contractor hasn’t disclosed, it could delay the award while the COI is investigated – or worse, disqualify the contractor for the award altogether. It’s not enough to gloss over potential areas of COI in hopes the agency doesn’t notice; in this information age it’s easier than ever for your competitors to investigate possible conflicts of interest and protest the awarded contract should they find one. Read more…

Government Contracting Best Practices