here_2_help

Here in SoCal -- and I imagine in other places as well -- DoD employees who have been furloughed can obtain (1) loan deferments and (2) $5,000 interest-free loans to help them out. These offers are from local credit unions. If you have been furloughed or are working without pay, please check with your bank to see if they have any special offers available for you.

Without knowing any of the facts, I'm willing to bet that the language was drafted at a high level and passed down; people are using the language they were given. It's not a matter of ethics; it's a matter of following direction. At least, that's what I think (again, acknowledging I have zero facts). We don't discuss politics here and I trust I'm not violating any Forum rules to add that so much of what transpires these days is performative rather than substantive. The quoted language strikes me as being performative.

That's really interesting. If I were advising the parties I would point out that the risk can be reduced by having the KO agree on what was relied on to reach price agreement. Something something fighter engine litigation.

Thank you all. This is helpful. I think it was the "retroactive" nature of Mod 4 that caught my eye. It appears that, instead of issuing a new Delivery/Task Order for new parts, the KO chose to add additional line items to the existing undefinitized Order, which (I suppose) means that it will now take longer for the parties to definitize. If only the F/A-18 were a mature program with history that the parties could use to reach quick price agreement ....

So the customer has modified for the fourth time an undefinitized delivery order under a definitized requirements contract? Okay. Sure. But why? Why do you even need a UCA when you have accepted terms in the parent contract?

Will somebody smarter & more experienced than I am please explain what's going on in this contract action, as reported in the DoW's daily report? I am trying to envision the sequence of events and now my head is hurting.

Thank you.

Thank you. You know what? That Instruction says nothing of substance. Nothing at all.

You know, I've tried to find DCMA Instruction 106 and wasted a decent amount of time doing so. My conclusion was that the Instruction is not available to the public. I would love to be proven wrong ....

Thank you. I was thinking G but I don't think the parties are consistent.

So ... where do I find the Schedule? In what part of the contract should I look?

I can see a contractor's history of project data, costs, on-time deliveries, positive customer correspondence, CPARs, etc., being fed into a Large Language Model. If the contractor is large and experienced, that would be a huge amount of information for an AI to mull over. Given a solicitation, it could identify similar projects that had been successfully performed. It could write up the benefits received--formerfed's "evidence" in support of the offeror's assertions. The LLM could look at solicitation requirements and identify gaps that need to be filled, in terms of either personnel to be hired or else subcontractors that need to be brought on board. The LLM could look at prior cost history for similar projects and make accurate estimates of future costs to be incurred. I can see all that happening; I expect it will happen. That said, I think people will still be needed, especially if what is being proposed is new and different from the past.

Let's hope history does not repeat. https://breakingdefense.com/2025/09/exclusive-navy-taps-four-aerospace-primes-to-design-autonomous-drone-wingmen/

The latest GAO Report on the F-35 Program has several headline-worthy findings. The one that caught my eye was the lengthy quote that follows ... which leads me to ask "Are incentive fees worth the time and effort of administering them?" I'll add that, in my experience, it can take years for the contracting parties to finalize program incentives (often because of the indirect rate finalization process, but also for other reasons). Do the seasoned professionals here think contract incentives are effective and, if so, are they worth the effort involved?

I've always been confused by that (bolded) word. What alternatives are available other than the contract action in hand?

Thought I would throw in this 1999 article which is one of my faves. One lesson learned is that progress payments don't correlate to program progress; they correlate to the contractor's ability to spend funds. Which is why we now have Performance-Based Payments, which are supposed to tie payments to program progress. I seem to recall a defense contractor CEO (Kresa?) talking about the "culture of hope" that permeated DoD acquisition. The contractor hoped that everything would work out perfectly. The government hoped that the contractor would perform. Everybody lived in hope but, at the same time, history told those same people that nothing every worked out perfectly, especially in development programs.

I did not read the draft article; I am responding to the three points you raised in your post. They got me thinking ... Can you separate culture from the people who make it up? Your focus seems to be on people, for obvious reasons. People are what drive culture, after all. But let's say you are a newcomer to the office. Do you accept the culture you get, or do you try to influence it, to change it? In this case, the culture is separate and distinct from the individual. So, maybe culture is an aggregation of individual attitudes, but also separate and distinct from any single individual, such that if you take the individual out of the culture, the culture still exists? Anyway, thought-provoking. To your points, I would suggest: Be curious. Interrogate the unwritten rules, the way it's always been done. Challenge the norms; respectfully request justification, especially if how it's always been done seems suboptimal. Suggest improvements. Know your customers' mission(s). Understand how your role supports and advances their mission. Understand how your efforts, and the efforts of those around you, create value. If you don't see the connection, maybe there isn't one and you need to move on. Personnel development should be the primary focus of any culture. It is perhaps even more important than supporting the mission. Any culture that doesn't support the development of its people should be avoided. As a corollary, any individual who resists development (e.g., opportunities to learn, grow, advance in skills/knowledge) should be sidelined and, if possible, eased out.

I'm certainly no expert, but wouldn't a letter to the contractor--issued prior to 01 October--informing the contractor that the Government intends to exercise the option on or about 01 October be sufficient, especially if the contractor agrees?

I reviewed the overhauled FAR Part 31. I saw no significant changes. None. Zero. I think there was maybe one or two sentences lined-out and some references were deleted. A missed opportunity to move the government away from prescriptive rules, in my view. Anybody see things differently?

That is the crux of the problem for many contractors. How does one quantify the impact for an individual contract if the cost is indirect? What if not all contracts are FFP? What if not all contracts contain the clause? It's a hairball of an issue.

To me, the key point here is that the subcontractor has completed work and delivered the product to the prime contractor. Accordingly, I would expect the prime to liquidate all progress payments made to the subK to date and make full FFP payment to the subK for the delivered goods. At that point, all costs paid to the subK are now prime contractor costs, and should be included in the prime's progress payment requests in accordance with the terms of the prime contract (i.e., 90% of costs incurred are eligible for reimbursement). That's my take, even though the original poster has moved on.

I believe the contractor has encountered an "after-imposed tax" (as defined in 52.229-6) and, therefore, is entitled to an appropriate price adjustment based on additional costs that were unforeseen at the time of contract formation by both parties.

I beg to differ. I assert there was no "smoking gun" COFC CAS case. Review boards were instituted to: (a) ensure "consistency" in KO decisions across the agency; and (b) provide coverage to KOs from adverse IG and GAO reports. Properly trained KOs who perform their job well and document their decisions do not need review boards. In fact, KOs spent far too many hours preparing their review packages for those boards. Pre-negotiation reviews. Post-negotiation reviews. An utter waste of everybody's time.

Problem: The proliferation of "review boards" at DCMA that review many decisions made by warranted contracting officers has created another bureaucracy within the bureaucracy. As a result, decisions take months longer to implement than should be the case. Scale: 5 of 7 Proposed Solution: Eliminate all review boards at DCMA. Instead, give warranted contracting officers authority inherent in their position to make business decisions on behalf of DoD. Hold them accountable as individuals for the quality of their decisions. Signed "Still Waiting for My FPRA to Be Approved by a Review Board Six Months After Submittal, Two Months After DCAA Audit, and Six Weeks After Handshake"

How do you know this? What regulation or contract clause requires this? Please be specific. If what you are saying is that "A contractor must include paid time off hours in its calculations of hours worked in order to determine whether or not OT has been worked" then that seems to be a different thing than what you posted. Regardless, OT laws vary state by state. In what state is the work being performed? What does that state's labor laws require regarding your question?