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Author: Admin

News You’d Rather Not Use…

Our sources throughout the GSA product schedules are indicating that the recent process for submitting a modification to the CO for approval before actually submitting it through eMod will be codified in the next round of Schedule refreshes.

While this will cut down on a CO’s official modification time in-house, it will probably mean longer wait times for contractors to obtain mod approval, as there will be no clock measuring the time that the CO will have the mod pre-submission.

We are hopeful that this analysis is incorrect, and your CO will understand that your Schedule modifications require timely approval and only assist the contractor in selling more products to the government. Hopeful….

Alert!

All GSA Schedule holders with Contracting Officers stationed in Texas should be aware that their COs will be in training next week, 24-28 April. They will most likely be unavailable to you for questions and modifications.

Ch Ch Ch Changes … to the GSA Schedules

GSA is preparing to release a round of Schedule refreshes next month, so prepare for a bunch of mass modifications. And if you are in the midst of completing your GSA Schedule proposal, either submit now or expect to review the entire solicitation again come April.

New policies represented in the GSA Schedules will include small business subcontracting changes, updates to those entities that can access the Schedules for purchases, SCA adjustments, and modifications in the Disaster Purchasing Program. For instance, the Red Cross and other qualified organizations will have access to the Schedules during emergency preparedness and disaster relief. Additionally, the following specifics may be of interest to our clients:

  • Subcontracting plans for ‘other-than-small’ businesses will now be at the CO’s discretion. For all intents and purposes, however, these will still have to be submitted with your proposal.
  • The Pathways to Success training has been removed as a requirement for streamlined offers.
  • Montenegro and New Zealand are now TAA compliant countries.
  • Federal contractors now receive paid sick leave.

If you have any questions about how these changes will affect your Schedule contract, feel free to give us a call at 301-913-5000. We look forward to assisting you with this new round of changes.

Get Ready for More GSA Refreshes and Mass Mods

Next month, GSA will refresh and release mass mods for all GSA Schedules regarding provision and clause updates.

Updates will incorporate changes in small business subcontracting, non-federal entities purchasing off the Schedules, and disaster purchasing.

A webinar concerning the changes will be held on Wednesday, 22 March at 2:00pm eastern time. You can register for the webinar here: https://meet.gsa.gov/e4et0bzib7a/event/event_info.html.

For more information, contact us at 301-913-5000.

How EZGSA makes your life easier!

Many contractors experience confusion when stepping into the word of GSA.There are huge amounts of information, and government language can make sense on the surface; however, in actuality this masks some rather complicated concepts. For instance, when your CO notifies you about a need to adjust your 72a report for last quarter because you reported $0 sales under 03FAC, you may not immediately understand that it was because your contract migrated to a new Schedule in October.
This actually happened with a client of ours recently. Our contract management team responded to the $0 sales by investigating and finding that second Schedule. In short, we know we can fix this issue.
Here’s the detail of this situation:
  • According to the government, the contractor has skipped out on payment to GSA. This can lead to harsh financial penalties, a cancelation of the GSA Schedule, and a big black mark on their government compliance record, labeled as either dishonesty (which could bar you from ever working with the government again) or negligence (which would require a lot of time and work to demonstrate that the failure in internal processes have been fixed).
  • The contractor assured us that they have reported sales to GSA, which lead us to deduce that there is likely another Schedule under either this DUNS number or company name or that another administrative flaw is afoot. After further analysis, we found that the contractor still had multiple Schedule contracts listed, and task orders being executed under the original contract are not referencing the new contract, while the IFF is.
  • This means that there is an unresolved technical glitch that will continue to cause problems until it is fixed, but it cannot be fixed until:
  • the 72a issue is addressed;
  • the Contracting Officer authorizes the fix, and;
  • the Administrative Contracting Officer (ACO) works with us to address possible additional problems for 72a reporting on the NEW contract, which currently registers at $0 sales.
  • Work currently being performed must be reissued under the new contract once the technical error is fixed so that the contractor is not in violation of the law. This causes more work for the client, and the thing they hired us to do was make them have less work.

Not only that, we have only 30 days from notification to solve the issue.

At EZGSA, we find the true source of the problem and understand its urgency. And, most importantly, we know how to fix it.

Most of our clients have no reason to comprehend this entire situation because we do. It’s our job, not theirs. We keep the pain-staking and time-dumping search for solutions out of their hair. We keep them from panic.