The GAO estimates that 27 percent of DoD mentor-protege agreements are deficient.
In a comprehensive new report, the GAO says that many active DoD mentor-protege agreements are missing basic (and necessary) information, like the protege’s primary NAICS code. Also missing, in some cases: the parties’ signatures.
It’s a well-known aspect of federal contracting: if a contractor wishes to formally dispute a matter of contract performance, the contractor should file a claim with the contracting officer.
But if the contractor is working under a task or delivery order, which contracting officer should be on the receiving end of that claim—the one responsible for the order, or the one responsible for the underlying contract?
As a recent Civilian Board of Contract Appeals decision demonstrates, when a contractor is performing work under a Federal Supply Schedule order, a claim involving the terms of the underlying Schedule contract must be filed with the GSA contracting officer.
I am on my way home from San Diego, where I spent yesterday at the APTAC Spring Conference. My presentation focused on recent major legal updates in government contracting, including key provisions of the 2017 National Defense Authorization Act, implementation of the All Small Mentor-Protege Program, and more.
The SBA has published a list of active All Small mentor-protege agreements. The list, which is available on the SBA’s website, is dated April 5, 2017. It’s not clear how often the SBA intends to update the list.
The April 5 list reveals that there are approximately 90 active All Small mentor-protege agreements, covering a wide variety of primary industry classifications. All major socioeconomic categories (small business, 8(a), SDVOSB, HUBZone, EDWOSB and WOSB) are represented.
There’s no reason why mentor-protege pairings should be a secret. Kudos to the SBA for publishing the list, which will be useful to contracting officers and industry alike (as well as those of us who are simply curious by nature).
One might think that when an electronic proposal is received by a government server before the solicitation’s deadline, the proposal isn’t late. A government server is under government control, so the proposal is timely, right?
Not necessarily, at least the way the GAO sees it. As one contractor recently learned, waiting until the last minute to submit a proposal electronically carries significant risk that the proposal will not be considered timely, even if the proposal reaches the government server in time.
It’s been a rainy spring here in Lawrence, but the sun is finally out today. And speaking of sunshine, I’ll be in sunny San Diego on Monday to speak at the APTAC Spring 2017 Training Conference. I am looking forward to catching up with many of my favorite “PTACers” next week.
Before I head to the West Coast, it’s time for our weekly rundown of government contracting news and commentary. In this week’s SmallGovCon Week In Review, a contractor has agreed to pay nearly $20 million to resolve accusations of overcharging the VA, the GSA is considering removing a mandate requiring industry partners to participate in the new Transactional Data Reporting pilot, the GAO concludes that DoD’s buying power is on the rise, and much more.
In evaluating a WOSB joint venture’s past performance, the procuring agency considered each joint venture member’s contemplated percentage of effort for the solicitation’s scope of work, and assigned the joint venture past performance ratings based on which member was responsible for particular past performance.
The GAO held that the agency had the discretion to evaluate joint venture past performance in this manner–although it is unclear whether a relatively new SBA regulation (which apparently didn’t apply to the solicitation) would have affected the outcome.