bob7947

That is one of the legislative provisions not adopted (LPNAs). I noticed there was a lot of verbage about a report. However, it is not associated with a part of the law. The LPNA also requires GAO to report within 6 months. It takes GAO longer than 6 months to get started. There are other late sections of the law that request GAO to report on labor laws.

Joel: Do you know the section?

I thought I remembered one section requiring intellectual property--of some sort--as an evaluation factor. I did a quick scan of the sections and the LPNAs and could not find it. Maybe I was having a nightmare. If you find something like that, please point it out. That seemed an especially bad idea to me. If I find it in the next few days when I do a 100% review, I'll point it out. I do have the wrong title of the Law on one of the pages.

I've added the draft 19th annual Wifcon.com analysis of the National Defense Authorization Act to the Home Page. It is draft because I haven't proofed all the textual mistakes and haven't finished the LPNAs, etc. Also, I haven't checked other parts of the law to see if there are other contracting perfections in the other titles of this wonderful piece of legislation. It's about 80 congressial perfections to defense contracting. Some perfections have perfected other annual perfections, etc. There is something for everone to love in it, I'm sure. Look at the bright side, there are over 30 more near-perfections that didn't make the cut. See the unfinished LPNAs.

I have a small business set-aside

I would not download the FAR or any supplement at all due to the contant changes in the regulations. I would use the Electronic Code of Federal Regulations (e-CFR) You will see in red "current as of December 31, 2019." Let's check a recent change to an agency supplement to see if the e-CFR updates. Go the the Home Page of Wifcon.com in the left column about half-way down. You will notce this change published in the Federal Register: You now know the GSAR has been changed. The hard copy you downloaded a couple of weeks ago, is outdated. If you look at the 12/19/2019 FR, you will see that GSAR Part 536 has been changed. Is the e-CFR current? Let's check. Go back to the e-CFR. Look for GSA. Ah, it is in chaper 5 of the FAR System. Click it. We're looking for Part 536. First mentally bracket Part [5]36 like this. That's to remember we are dealing with the FAR System. Scroll down to Subpart 536.1 and click it. Notice 536.102 xxx. You will see notification of the 12/19/2019 change as a link. Click the link. It shows you the change where it is supposed to be in the GSAR which is part of the FAR System and tells you when it is effective. The DFARS was modified on 12/31/2019 as the Wifcon.com Home Page shows. I am not aware of any more recent change to the FAR System. That is probably why the e-CFR says current as of 12/31/2019. An added advantage of the e-CFR is that it shows latest FR change in brackets at ends of sections. Over the past 2 decades, I've seen the FARsite and acquisition.gov grow to their current forms. I've also seen agencies, who once published their own supplement on their contracting pages, link to the e-CFR as I do. I am quite sure that the e-CFR has a direct link to the FR so it can update immediately. This is the electronic age (and my terminology for this age may be outdated too) and the e-CFR is the best that I've seen on the internet. Nothing compares to it. Everything is at your fingertips according to the FAR system. It's always there with you. You can check it on your desktop, your laptop, your note pad, your phone.

Contractor Team Arrangement (CTA)

This is GAO's rule, repeated over and over during previous decades to justify cancelling a solicitation. There is a difference for IFBs and that is included elsewhere. an agency concludes that a solicitation does not accurately reflect its needs. a lack of funding justified the decision to cancel offeror's protest--and the attendant stay of contract award and performance--caused the agency's requirements to change. the agency reasonably determined that it should cancel the RFP and resolicit after clarifying its tiered evaluation process. when none of the proposals received were evaluated as technically acceptable. The record shows that the agency is considering whether the cleaning and janitorial services required under the soliciation should have be procured from an AbilityOne vendor. the PWS requirements focused only on the functional capabilities of the software, and failed to capture the agency’s needs regarding ease of use. the possibility of increased competition generally provides a reasonable basis for an agency to cancel a solicitation. the record indicates that the agency intends to refine the SOW and the solicitation to increase the likelihood that vendors other than the incumbent can prevail in this competition The agency has demonstrated that the cancellation occurred after the agency identified flaws in the solicitation that reasonably could be expected to limit competition. Because the RFQ failed to state salient characteristics that equal products must meet, VA had reasonable basis to cancel the solicitation. the solicitation did not clearly apprise vendors whether the procurement was being conducted on a sealed bid or negotiated procurement basis. GSA discovered after contract award that the RFP did not include a mandatory DFARS clause requiring the contractor to use a U.S.-flag vessel, and therefore the solicitation did not comply with the requirements of the Cargo Preference Act. the solicitation because the basis of award set forth in the solicitation did not reflect the agency’s intended procurement approach. If an agency cannot purchase at a "fair and reasonable" price, as required by the FAR, then cancellation is warranted. the uncertainty surrounding the future need for the services provided a reasonable basis upon which to cancel the solicitation. Correcting [errors] to allow for a fair and equal competition provides a reasonable basis for canceling the solicitation. an agency's cancellation of a negotiated procurement after receiving proposals where the agency determined that the solicitation overstated the agency's requirements and the agency would seek enhanced competition by relaxing its requirements. [agency's] technical needs have changed, increasing beyond what the contract award would have provided, and that the statement of work (SOW) also no longer reflects the government's needs. The management of an agency's funds generally depends on the agency's judgment concerning which projects and activities should receive increased or reduced funding and a contracting agency has the right to cancel a solicitation when, as a result of its allocation determinations, sufficient funds are not available. Since QSSI's task order was issued under a solicitation that did not accurately reflect the agency's minimum needs, but instead was more restrictive of competition than necessary, and thus may have deterred some firms from competing or submitting a more advantageous quotation, we conclude that HUD properly terminated QSSI’s order. reducing maximum quantities can allow further competition from firms unable to perform at the originally stated quantities, but with the ability to perform at lower quantities. You can probably double the variety of examples by researching here.

Here is an example of an award fee plan. Some things to ponder. 5.3: Award Fee Score. Look at Good and "51 - 75" What do you think about score for good? A more thorough grading scale is provided in Attachment C. Is a good rating consistent with the description provided in Attachment C. 5.1: Performance Areas and Evaluation Criteria. There are 3 areas. The first 2 areas have a weight of 80% of award fee. In those 2 areas, there are 18 subfactors to be evaluated. What do you think of having 18 subfactors for 80 percent of the award fee. Is the effectiveness of the award fee diluted?

Here is an Air Force Award Fee Guide. It looks as though it may have substance. To be effective, the award and base fee must meet the needs of the requirement. It is rare to find a good one.

Each year about this time, I read an editorial by Francis Pharcellus Church that was published in The Sun on September 21, 1897. The editorial is in response to a letter written by eight-year-old Virginia O’Hanlon. Now, this entry is not about the contents of the editorial but I will add my favorite part of the editorial: Mr. Church's prose is beautiful. He died in 1906 and Virgina died in 1971. Check out the brief description of the two in Wikipedia. In her letter to The Sun, Virginia printed her address as 115 W. 95th St. Does it still exist? Yes, see 115 W. 95th St. Between 113 and 117 you will see 115 in the center above the windows. To the left of 115, you will see The Studio School at the entrance. The Studio School is a private, elementary-middle school and was founded in 1971, the year Virginia died. In 2009, The Studio School honored Virginia by attaching a plaque to 115 which you can see on the Google Maps image. What does the placque say? You cannot read it on Google Maps but I've added the contents as the final part of this entry.

You can research by going to FAR 15.206 (e): Cancellation of solicitation.

On the Home Page, I posted the annual GAO Fiscal Year (FY) bid protest results for 2019. The numbers were affected by the government shutdown. When I posted them, I realized Wifcon.com now has 23 years of statistics. ( I noticed some mistakes in my footnotes for last year and corrected them. If you see any, let me know.) GAO's annual statistics weren't published in its annual reports until FY 2003. In that year, it published its statistics back to 2001. You will see Wifcon.com's statistics go back to FY 1997. How is that? I remember calling the GAO bid protest unit to get some FY numbers for those early years. How did I know they existed? I don't remember but there are an extra 4 years here.

Perhaps, if someone steals it and takes it away, it becomes a supply to the thief.😋

I found a case decided in the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit called Guarantee Company of North America v. Ikhana, LLC, 2018-1394, October 29, 2019. It involved a surety's rights. In general, the Court uses precedent from two cases to reach its opinion on p. 7 of the opinion. On the next page, two pf the judges issue a concurring opinion and point out their concerns with the court's precedents. These 2 judges write that: The instant case is an appropriate vehicle to review our precedent and to resolve a question of exceptional importance, as the issue is raised squarely by these facts. It is worth thinking about. The excerpt below is the jist of the two judges explanation and it appears on p. 10 and 11 of their opinion.

Retreadfed: I added them to the poll. Thanks.

Please log in and vote in this poll. It will have an effect on how this site will look in the future. I want to understand your needs and interests. It only takes a couple of minutes.

This poll is multiple choice. Do you work on contracts only or are you also involved in grants and cooperative agreements? If you are involved in contracts only, check contracts. If you are involved in any combination of contracts, grants, and cooperative agreements, check the ones that apply to you. There are other forms of federal assistance, ie. SBA loans etc. If you are involved in other than contracts, grants, or cooperative agreements, please explain in a post. Your votes in this poll are not public.

I found this article also.

This is funny. Read the entire page.

Below is from DFARS. That should get one started. 215.404-70 DD Form 1547, Record of Weighted Guidelines Method Application. Joel found the form from here.

Retreadfed: I've added a law firm's explanation of Defective pricing and I've added a little blurb by another firm focused on DCAA. As Yogi once said about a baseball game, "It ain't over till it's over." That's one way of looking at whether questioned costs ever become defective pricing.

All assistance to a member is appreciated.

Gene: I would Google "purchase request," "procurement request," "purchase order request," etc., and find out what is wanted on the forms that appear. Also think of "requsition request," "requsition order number," which may be similar of the same as a "procurement request." Only look at those items from a dot.gov or dot.mil site. Here is something from DoD's Procedures, Guidance, and Information (PGI). Check the difference between the DoD PGI and DoD DFARS before you use it. Also, you may wish to Google "COR Handbook," etc. to see what you can find there. If you understand what the procurement request collects, you will understand its function, and you probably can develop your own definition. Consider what other's post in this topic.

Retreadfed: This is amusing. You mentioned the 9th Circuit in an earlier post. Here's a couple blurbs on Trott. From the 1987 Post article. Stephen S. Trott is now a Senior Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He was nominated in 1987 and confirmed in 1988. Lesson: Always keep your next job in mind.