GSA Proposes to Remake its Schedules Program
Today, the General Services Administration (GSA) announced that it will be consolidating all of its Multiple Award Schedules (GSA Schedules) over the next couple of years. GSA Schedules, when combined, are the largest government-wide contracting vehicle utilized by the federal government with 11 million products and services available and more than $23 billion in sales in FY 2016. State and local governments also have the option of purchasing off of GSA Schedules.
For the uninitiated, GSA Schedule contracts are long-term contracting vehicles (they have a base five-year term with three five-year option periods). The attraction to agencies throughout the federal government is that GSA negotiates prices and discounts with suppliers to ensure that the products and services are sold at fair and reasonable prices. GSA currently administers 24 separate Schedules that cover just about any commercial product or service the government purchases, including professional services, hardware, automotive, medical equipment, building materials, furniture, office supplies and administrative support services.
According to GSA, the new single schedule will include both products and services and will have one set of terms and conditions. As GSA stated in its news release announcing this change, this consolidation will ensure more consistency in contracting practices.
This move is not surprising. GSA stated in its June 2018 Industry Day focused on the Section 846 portal that it was looking to consolidate its 24 schedules. In addition, such a move will help the schedules program compete with other government-wide purchasing programs, such as NASA’s Solutions for Enterprise-Wide Procurement (for the purchase of IT products and ancillary services) and the aforementioned Section 846 portal that is currently being developed by OMB and GSA.
Because this is such a dramatic change, GSA has determined that it will use a phased approach to implement it over the next two years. In addition, it will solicit feedback from stakeholders, including industry. The first opportunity to do so will be at GSA’s next Industry Day on Dec. 12, 2018. Further information is here.
Holland & Knight’s government contract team will post further updates as more information becomes available.