Teat6351

BINGO... C-FSS-370 is in there.... Ill need to review this more.... VERY HELPFUL!!!!!

I reviewed our business meal policy and it discusses what constitutes a business meal in fair detail, as well as distinguishes the difference between a travel meal. The policy also dictates the terms of what the employee must provide to support the meal as a qualifying expense (e.g. individuals involves, nature of business discusses, receipts, etc.). Now moving to our disclosure statement, its not as specific, but does discuss costs that are direct attributable to meetings specific to a contract (specific final cost objective) are a direct expense. Now completely separately is the timing of these meetings, which sometimes happen during non-business hours (after 5 PM). Even though the meetings are specific to a final cost objective, I find it difficult to bill the associated meals seeing that the customer may not be being charged for the time the employees spent at the meeting... and entirely different topic, yet I believe because we are not on a total time keeping system that puts us in a bit of a quandary. This is were I believe we may have screwed up. The task orders that may have associated business meals were not priced in anticipation with business meals. Something to remedy going forward. Of course, if the government agrees these costs are associated with the travel CLIN we have. Now if its a non-travel business meal seems like it would be considerd an ODC. But again we would need agreement from the KO at this point. Of course the BPA that was associated with this competitive solicitation does not address anything specific about business meals, nor did the sample task orders that were provided with the solicitation. So FAR 52.216-7 is not in our contract - unfortunately. So that leaves a bit of the gray area, and subsequently I tried to read in a clause that is not present.

My company was awarded a competitive contract under our Federal Supply Schedule from GSA. The predominance of the work is to provide services under our established T&M Rates, also line items were established for Travel/ODCs and material, both are considered reimbursable with no fee. The contract includes a term that our company is required to follow the Joint Travel Regulations, our company took no exception to the terms during the solicitation. Recently, we have incurred business meals against task orders and the government questions their allowability to the contract, stating the cost would be an indirect expense and should have been considered in our T&M rates (which of course our FSS does not assume). And later, stated that our contract does not deal with business meals as we don't have a cost line item to recoup such costs. In order to defend the cost I immediately went to evaluate FAR 31 (specifically the sections dealing with business meals). Since we are able to meet the requirements provided in FAR 31 (meaning costs can be allocable, are accounted for, do not represent an entertainment cost, have a specific purpose, 100% related to the direct efforts of the contract, and are not unallowable per FAR 31.2), I assumed we would just negotiate with the customer what are a reasonable expense for the business meals, and that would be it. However, I realized that there are no part 31 clauses are in our FSS, and no other terms exist in our BPA associated with this work. Is it a leap of faith to assume FAR 31 would be considered when discussing business meals as the contract does not address business meals, nor does the JTRs? Advice is appreciated.

ji20874, thanks for the response. Most of the information that is provided is Technical Data, specifically generated by the DoD, for analysis by our company. I am not sure what form or format that data is in, but I believe it may be distributed on various physical media and sent via email. We do receive software as well, the software is normally distributed by the USG with unlimited rights.... these are just examples. I'm sure there are more examples but I believe that's the predominance of the information we receive.

I understand my question may be a bit loaded (that wasn't the intent).... My contract does not have provision related to privacy, nor does the information that we are discussing apply, the SOW has no reference materials, I have not asked the KO, never said anything about not consulting an attorney (poor assumption). I assumed that information, rather it be software (in this case non-commercial) or other types of information like technical data, that is not classified and likely has markings such as FOUO or had similar protective marking, required some form of tracking to ensure that information was not lost throughout the life of a contract. I must be looking at this way too simply, and please forgive my ignorance as I wanted to get the jist of what to consider...some of that has been pointed out, but I suspect GFI is not discussed significantly in the FAR or DFAR because the focus is less on the control aspect (as it relates to tracking) and moreso on dissemination/distribution... which seems to be more of the focus of this thread and that still is not my question... I was only concerned with the perspective of tracking the information (and that also relates to reporting it while in our possession). If their are statutes that indicate protections, then by all means that's a mechanism of mgt and control. I was being a bit more simple in my viewpoint and only evaluating general practice of managing information and then later having to report it to the government.

I understand why you are trying to bring up IP rights, but that's a separate factor and I am not considering that in my question on this forum as it relates to mgt and control because I am looking more at the documented mgt aspect of GFI. I am just asking general rules as it relates to mgt and control that are prescribed in the FAR and DFAR. If neither resource says anything or there is not a general rule published then I wanted the experts to chime in. Vern, you made a connection between two items that are not detailed in my reference material, and someone disagreed with you... with that said I agree that its probably the best practice as you described. This is about expert opinions not legal advice, so your input is appreciated. We all work with this stuff, I want to understand the general practice. So thanks for your input.

let me clarify my question, for unclassified GFI what are the regulations (if any) that are described to in the FAR of DFAR for GFI as it relates to management and control. The FAR seems to indicate that FAR 45 is not applicable. Now to Vern's point, information that's provided via physical media would be controlled no different than government furnished property as described in Part 45... I can buy into that point, I just find it strange its not documented in the FAR, but seems logical nonetheless. Now information that is provided through email, or other electronic means that are not tied something tangible, what is the typical practice of control and management and is there any recommendations through the FAR or DFAR that further describes the requirements on the contractor (this assumes no special clauses are present in your contract that describes such practices)? My last point, the government information that is provided to contractors through electronic means is later inputted into the contractor's system (database, etc), at the end of a contract that information would need to be dispositioned, without a provision that I am aware of I am still unsure about how its managed. I hope this is slightly clearer.

Vern thanks for probing. The property is sometimes provided on physical media and at other times is provided electronically. If electronically provided is there a requirement for controls? But to go further, if the information (lets say software) that resides on the physical media is put into a database, what rules apply then? Not trying to overcomplicate it, but seems as though if we are talking controls then at some point we are responsible for the dispersions of that information within our systems.

I couldn't find this topic covered on the forum. Government Furnished Information (GFI) is not covered under Part 45 as I found???.... As it relates to unclassified GFI (not classified GFI), if no special contract requirements exist for managing unclassified Government Furnished Information under a contract, what would be a good rule of practice as it relates to controls and management (tracking) and later dealing with return or destruction of such information. I suspect some general guidance would be found somewhere so contractors don't displace such information, and at some point the responsibility of the contractor to identify and later return such information is paramount (in my opinion). I did note that DFAR 252.227-7025 deals with limitation on use and disclosure, but doesn't discuss controls, reporting etc. So at this point I am just confused on what requirements are designed to handle GFI. If I have missed something in the FAR or DFAR or elsewhere as it relates to managing GFI please let me know as I did try to do research but found very little. thanks!

thanks Vern!

The company I work for has established a CRADA with a government agency. As with most CRADA's, including this one, some form of contribution is required. With that said, our company normally funds our CRADA activity through strategic investment. However, a recent request came by my desk funding the CRADA work with Independent Research and Development funds. I have done some research and have not found any information that would prohibit such action. Yet it does seem odd to me as our costs are recovered through our indirect rates, however, those costs are considered our own investment costs. If some guidance would be provided Id greatly appreciate it.