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Vbus

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  1. fereirra, Perhaps you are thinking about T&M? If the contract type was time-and-materials or labor-hour then the applicable payment clause prohibits the payment of fee on materials, which includes subcontracts for supplies and incidental services for which there is not a labor category specified in the contract. See FAR 52.232-7((7).
  2. I always "liked" this sentence: 19.602-1 Referral. (a) Upon determining and documenting that an apparent successful small business offeror lacks certain elements of responsibility (including, but not limited to, capability, competency, capacity, credit, integrity, perseverance, tenacity, and limitations on subcontracting, but for sureties see 28.101-3(f) and 28.203(c )), the contracting officer shall? (1) Withhold contract award (see 19.602-3); and (2) Refer the matter to the cognizant SBA Government Contracting Area Office (Area Office) serving the area in which the headquarters of the offeror is located, in accordance with agency procedures, except that referral is not necessary if the small business concern? (i) Is determined to be unqualified and ineligible because it does not meet the standard in 9.104-1(g), provided, that the determination is approved by the chief of the contracting office; or (ii) Is suspended or debarred under Executive Order 11246 or Subpart 9.4.
  3. The FAR has 53 parts. People often think it ends at 52 and forget 'Forms'. An anthropomorphized Part 53 might say, "Woe is me" as a way to express its sadness over constantly being forgotten and/or disrespected. If you're not sure that 'Part 53' would feel that way, consider a similar story: http://www.amazon.com/Little-Red-Caboose-G...k/dp/0307021521
  4. I couldn't help myself. Loki, Is this your scenario? WIFCON readers, WIFCON readers, I'm advising on an agency level IDIQ evaluation for professional engineering services. We are evaluating proposals under a solicitation for an IDIQ contract for services. Prices to be on contract will be ceiling prices for various line items of professional labor, with task orders competed for upcoming requirements. The contract will have loaded labor rates. The contract will be multiple award and task orders will be competed. The solicitation language makes line item price reasonableness important, but also has a balancing test that gives consideration of the line item prices in the context of the overall offered/evaluated price (line items x estimated quantities for each). The price of each loaded labor rate is being evaluated. Also, the total price of the contract is being evaluated by multiplying the proposed labor rates by our estimated number of hours for each labor category. That balancing test was intended to make sure no line item prices were excessive, but to allow for natural variation amongst offers above and below the mean (or median) without setting arbitrary cutoffs for line item pricing - with the notion that true outliers on a CLIN would be deemed a high risk, and result in offeror elimination. My plan was to evaluate both labor rates and total contract price so that our price evaluation is complete. I believe that although an offeror may propose some labor rates that are higher than Government estimates and perhaps higher than the average of all offerors, having higher rates on a few labor categories doesn't mean that the offer doesn't represent the best value. I believe that only when evaluating labor rates and total contract price can our price evaluation be complete. Total price to the Government was to be assessed through the lens of the overall offered price values. So again, total contract price is being evaluated. Both the evaluation of line item pricing and the evaluation of overall offered price had roles. And to restate, our price evaluation will include evaluating labor rates and total contract price. New players have come into the mix, and are debating taking a very hard line on CLIN level pricing, as opposed to just scrubbing the CLIN level for excessive prices - which in my view may nix the balancing test, potentially rendering the role of the overall offered price case meaningless, and I see risk in that. Some in my office have commented that we should only evaluate labor rates and not total contract price. These individuals feel that we should not consider offers where the offeror proposed any labor rates that are determined to be too high. I believe to automatically "throw out" an offer that contains one or more labor rate that is deemed "too high" doesn't allow for the possibility that the offer as a whole represents the best value. The expressed reason for the new take on what to do with CLIN level price evaluation is that the solicitation states CLIN prices will be reviewed for reasonableness. The reason that some in my office have the opinion that we should only evaluate labor rates is because that's what our solicitation states. True, but that's true regardless of if that's stated or not, and has to understood in context of the overall price evaluation model so as to not upset the balancing test (to not render it meaningless). It is true that the solicitation states that the Government will evaluate labor rates. I believe that does not mean that we can not / will not also evaluate total contract price. It seems to come down to two different views of what is reasonable for CLIN level prices in the award of a contract. So there is disagreement in my office on how to perform the price evaluation. Some believe we should evaluate only labor rates. I believe that we should evaluate labor rates and total contract price. Any suggestions of what to say to or show (e.g., words, FAR or case law cites) folks to help them use jurisprudence in this matter - they seem stuck and the conversation is looping? Any thoughts?
  5. Looking for a case where prior to exercising an option, the Contracting Officer failed to conduct an "informal analysis" of the market to determine that the option price was still better than prices available on the open market, where it was later discovered that the option price was no longer the best price and the CO was held accountable for claiming that he had made that determination. Does this sound familiar to anyone?
  6. dw, A follow-up question to your discussion: If you place an FSS BPA in which task orders against the BPA will all be T&M or LH, should the ordering CO perform the necessary D&F at the BPA-level, or should each task order under the BPA have its own unique D&F?
  7. Formerfed, Yes, my mistake, the COPPER CAP program is Air Force. Navy (and several other agencies) have similar programs: http://www.fai.gov/FAIC/AcquisitionInternPrograms.asp
  8. The following article describes the impending executive order to end the Federal Career Intern Program: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...0122502099.html I'm curious what you think this will mean to programs like Navy's COPPER CAP program, The Treasury Acquisition Institute, and DOI's Governmentwide Acquisition Management Intern Program, and what this will mean to the 1102 workforce in general.
  9. As a follow-on to Bailers question, how do you classify an acquisition that will include work that is both construction and services? If Bailer's IDIQ contemplated the award of task orders for dredging work and environmental site assessment work, would you classify it as construction or services based on the higher percentage or would you need to follow regulations that governed both the acquisition of construction and services? I happened to come across this example on FBO: https://www.fbo.gov/index?s=opportunity&amp...mode=list&=
  10. My apologies for typing faster than thinking. I was attempting to draw the correlation between LOE and cost and did so inarticulately. When a CPFF Term form contract includes a clause to the effect that if the contractor does not deliver the entire level of effort it will be entitled only to a percentage of the fixed fee that is commensurate with the percentage of the level of effort actually delivered (i.e. if contractor delivers 80% of LOE it is entitled to 80% of fixed fee), the contractor will "maximize" their fee (i.e. get 100% of fixed fee) by expending the entire level of effort (i.e. performing 100% of the LOE). This is, of course, allowed under the contract but provides no incentive for the contractor to achieve the objectives of the contract at less cost. I agree a CPIF contract is the way to so incentivize a contractor. My experiences have been similar to DBH's where a contractor under a CPFF/LOE contract claims that government technical direction altered the contractor's technical approach / labor mix.
  11. If a contractor's goal is to obtain the maximum amount of fee, then under a CPFF Term Form contract can't the contractor can best achieve that by incurring the maximum amount of costs allowed under the contract? There's no incentive for the contractor to find efficiencies or find other ways to reduce costs. Cost control on these contracts relies almost solely on Government surveillance, which would seem to make it the most difficult to control. In DBH's case where the contract also allows for the flexibility of government personnel to direct contractor performance, that technical direction may alter the technical approach and/or labor mix used by the contractor from what they had originally proposed. I agree the contractor is bound to the LOE and labor rates stated in the contract, but without an incentive to reach the contract's objective or a final end product for the Government to accept, the burden is on the Government to surveil the contract to ensure costs are being incurred wisely. Perhaps its better to say that the worst contract for controlling cost overruns is the contract that does not include the proper controls and incentives for monitoring costs, and is administered by personnel who don't understand how or care about controlling contract costs.
  12. American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) reporting requirements. These contractor submitted reports are housed in ANOTHER federal database (federalreporting.gov) and require lot of duplicative information already found in FPDS. One of the most noteworthy reporting requirements is the "Jobs Created" field that requires the contractor to calculate the number of jobs created or saved for each reporting quarter. This is done through an awkward calculation of hours performed on the contract per quarter divided by 520 regular quarter hours (2080 hours / 4 quarters = 520 qtr hrs). This must be done on FFP contracts as well. The report must be submitted by the 15th after each quarter and reviewed by at least one agency official. A government review board reviews all recipient reporting for each agency for consistency. The review board informs the Contracting Officer of any reporting issues that may need to be corrected and the CO coordinates any reporting fixes with the contractor before the 30th after each quarter. There was (and continues to be) a significant amount of training to both government and contractor employees on ARRA reporting requirements, generally developed and given by government employees. There was agency policy developed for both grants and contracting offices. Automated financial and procurement systems were altered to properly track ARRA contracts and grants. ARRA funds were available for obligation in FY09-10.
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