White House Issues Guidance for Multiple-Award Contracts

On September 29, The Office of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP) issued guidance to federal agency chief acquisition officers and senior procurement executives in their effort to curb duplication of multiple award contracts (MACs).  Starting Jan 1, 2012, agencies must prepare business cases – analyses to ensure agencies aren’t duplicating an existing contract – through a four-step process for any new MACs with a total value of more than $250 million. This guidance, already in place for new or renewable government wide acquisition contracts, will be extended to include multi-agency or interagency contracts, where the potential for overlap with existing contracts is greater. This guidance comes after the FAR Council issued an interim rule last December requiring business cases for MACs.  The FAR council has not yet issued a final rule.  OFPP has plans to expand the requirement to include MACs over $100 million in 2013 and $50 million in 2014. Contract duplication is costly and time-consuming for federal contractors who have to run and bid on these contracts.  AGC will monitor the federal agencies’ implementation of this guidance and the FAR Council’s issuance of a final rule. For more information, please contact Marco Giamberardino at (703) 837-5325 orgiamberm@agc.org.