The Truth in Negotiations Act

The United States government is the largest single purchaser of goods and services in the world. Even during times of economic hardship, the US continues to dump billions into the private sector. The federal procurement spending rate of growth has surpassed the rate of U.S. inflation every year, since 2000. With annual federal procurement budgets of more than $400 billion, it is no surprise that the competition for government contracts has increased tremendously. Consequently, more and more companies are trying to get a piece of the action. When these companies adhere to all of the required regulations and statutes, they expect their proposals to be evaluated and the contract awarded in

PURPOSE. This document provides historical information regarding the Davis-Bacon Act and present day implications of the Act. Davis-Bacon, established in 1931, sets a wage requirement for all construction contracts over $2,000 that are either partially or fully supported with government funds. While the Act has been controversial for many years, efforts to repeal the Act completely or to increase the dollar-value threshold have failed. Some argue that the Act increases cost to Government construction contracts and may reduce competition or eliminate it completely for small businesses (CBO, 1983). Regardless, under FAR 22.404, we are responsible for ensuring that the requirements of the Davis-Bacon Act are enforced and incorporated into our solicitations and contracts.

Contract monitoring is the systematic review of a contractor’s records, activities, etc. to ensure compliance with the terms and conditions of the contract (Texas HHSC 2015). Because privatization aims to provide the government with the best value in terms of quality, service, and conditions, contracting does not end after the procurement process (Schooner 2011, 3). The administration of the contract, including monitoring, is just as important to ensuring that the state gets the best value. Despite the fact that there is a clear contract monitoring process within HHS, time is not always invested into developing a comprehensive monitoring approach and funds are not always allocated towards that process, preventing agencies

Part 15 of the Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) “prescribes [the] policies and procedures governing competitive and noncompetitive negotiated acquisitions.” One component of negotiated acquisitions that occurs early in the acquisition process is the solicitation of proposals. FAR 15.201, titled, “Exchanges with Industry before Receipt of Proposals,” regulates the type and manner of communications, also sometimes referred to as exchanges, which can – and cannot – take place between the Government and potential suppliers prior to the receipt of a potential supplier’s proposal and the subsequent award of a contract.

Professional Building Maintenance Corporation versus the School Board of the County of Spotsylvania is a 2012 case decided by the Virginia Supreme Court. The appellant, Professional Building Maintenance Corporation, challenged the School Board of the County of Spotsylvania on several issues including the use of “Best Value” as the method of procurement. To understand the case, one needs to understand why “best value” came about in Virginia, what was the definition of “best value”, and what laws governed “best value” procurements.

Once I have a clear Statement of work and the previous vendors are interested in bidding; I will compete this procurement to the best practices of government procurement are achieves.

b) Another alternative should be using the negotiation method in order to develop a “win-win” situation. A negotiating party would have to be applied, “When a long period of time is required to produce the items purchased” (p 375). In these circumstances, suitable economic price adjustment clauses must be negotiated. Opportunities for various improvements may develop, such as the new manufacturing methods, new packaging possibilities, substitute materials, new plant layouts, and new tools. Negotiation permits an examination and evaluation of all these potential improvements. Competitive bidding does not. The advantage would be assurance of a long-term business with the Company along with reasonable profit for the supplier and reasonable cost for the buyer.

Global business environment has become more unstable, supplier negotiations have taken important new role on helping improve corporate competitiveness. The goal of most supplier negotiations today is no longer just to get the lowest price. It is also to find new and innovative ways to meet a wide variety of business challenges, often by tapping into the knowledge and expertise of the supplier community and a good relationship.

This paper will explore how Sealed Bidding and Competitive proposals compare against each other. In order to compare them one must understand how, when and why each topic is used. The primary source of federal procurement information and guidance is the Federal Acquisition Regulation, which consists of Parts 1-53 of Title 48 of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR). FAR parts 14 and 15 explains in full detail Sealed Bidding and Competitive Proposals. This paper like the federal government will rely heavily on the FAR as a source document to help explain the details of this topic.

Strict adherence to formal procedures characterizes sealed bidding which attempts to provide a “level playing field” or as a multitude of references point out equal footing to all bidders who compete for a contract. Competitive negotiation is a more flexible process that enables the agency to conduct discussions, evaluate offers, and award the contract using price and other factors. The Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR), whose origins can be traced back to the ASPA of 1947 was codified at Title 48 of the Code of Federal Regulations and became effective 1 April 1984. The FAR contains the uniform policies and procedures for acquisitions by all federal agencies to date. It addresses nearly every procurement related statute or executive policy; and subsequently encompasses every stage of the acquisition process. In a nutshell, FAR appears to have modernized and thus enveloped the aforementioned three acts.

In its defense, NNS claimed that DCAA may subpoena materials that it is used only for determining contract costs or data that is utilized for allocating costs to specific Government contracts. However, these documents provide DCAA with factual data that is used to verify actual cost both direct and indirect (i.e. G&A overhead cost.) The court rejected NNS’s argument that proposes that DCAA can only review cost or pricing data used to calculate costs charged to the Government.

Procurement intends to explore supply market opportunities and to implement resourcing strategies that deliver the best possible supply outcome to the organization, its stakeholders and clients (Kidd, 2005). Therefore, construction procurement exists to purchase a construction project as requirement of firms or organizational entities to achieve its goals. However, the choice to use external resources is the part of firms’ decision-making

The need for timely and accurate technical and cost or price evaluations and determinations of price reasonableness of multi-billion dollars bids is a critical part of the public sector procurement process. To determine what is involved, this paper provides a review of the relevant literature concerning the need for technical evaluations and factors to be used in determining the competitive range. An outline of the final evaluation report is followed by a discussion concerning which factors should be used when evaluating price reasonableness. Finally, an examination of different methods of price analysis and a determination of which price analysis method would be best suited for this project is followed by a summary of the research and important findings concerning these issues in the conclusion.

There was no formal bidding process. In addition, it appeared that not all bidders were treated equally. This can be seen when the bidding process was opened back up after the contractors were narrowed down to

OJEU Regulations provide four choices of procurement procedure: open, restricted, competitive dialogue and negotiated; following this, public authorities have an option to choose between the open and restricted procedures (OGC, 2008[6]). WHG has a pre-qualification requirement for contractors with experience in working with housing associations and building affordable housing units. In