Federal Acquisition Regulation

  • The Pentagon’s Defense Innovation Unit-Experimental thinks it’s learned a thing or two about rapid acquisition over the year since its initial standup, and sees no good reason why the rest of the Defense Department can’t use the same techniques it’s put in place to award new contracts in 60 days or less.

    December 02, 2016
  • The General Services Administration says it's working through a series of legislative and regulatory changes that would help agencies buy cloud computing services as a "utility."

    November 16, 2016
  • Federal employees will not be able to submit new Flexible Spending Account claims for health care or dependent care for a month this summer, starting July 30.

    June 23, 2016
  • Richard Lieberman, a consultant and retired attorney, makes the case that agencies can’t pick and choose when to apply the Federal Acquisition Regulations to task orders under multiple award contracts.

    April 04, 2016
  • Federal contractors got a sort of present for the new year — four new clauses in the Federal Acquisition Regulation to deal with in 2016. They were published in final form early in December. Procurement attorney Joseph Petrillo of the law firm Petrillo and Powell joined Federal Drive with Tom Temin discuss them and how they'll affect government buying.

    January 07, 2016
  • Richard Lieberman, a consultant and retired attorney, offers advice to contractors about how to ensure they are protected when they win a request for quote.

    October 14, 2015
  • Can we talk? That's what government and industry have been asking for decades. The answer is yes, and there's plenty of Federal Acquisition Regulation backup for that. Yet the administration thought it needed to launch the mythbusters initiative to get industry and government talking at the pre-solicitation stage. That was followed by last year's Open Dialog initiative. How's it all working? Millisa Gary, the procurement ombudsman at the General Services Administration, joined Tom Temin and Emily Kopp on the Federal Drive to offer some answers.

    March 03, 2015
  • The Defense Department may be losing faith in the prices on the Federal Supply Schedule. DoD says its contracting officers can't assume the prices are fair and reasonable, so they need to make an extra effort to make sure they're the best option available. That mindset should sound familiar because it's already part of the Federal Acquisition Regulation. Larry Allen, president of Allen Federal Business Partners and author of the Week Ahead newsletter, tells In Depth with Francis Rose, whether this is a duplicative rule or not.

    April 08, 2014
  • The Defense Department, General Services Administration and NASA issued a final rule today amending the Federal Acquisition Regulation. FAR must now include performance rating categories and different factors for past performance evaluations.

    August 01, 2013
  • A new site, called Wage Determination Online, is a permanent resource for researching information on service contracts and labor standards.

    July 05, 2011
  • Marcia Madsen, partner at Mayer Brown LLP, joins host Roger Waldron for a discussion about how Organizational Conflicts of Interest, will be affected by the Federal Acquisitions Regulation update. May 3, 2011

    May 03, 2011
  • The Defense Department is looking to standardize the procedures its components use in source selection under competitive acquisitions. New DoDwide procedures issued this month will take effect in July.

    March 16, 2011
  • Buyers in the Defense Department who bundle small contracts into larger ones will have to post their actions on the Web. Bundling is the subject of a new interim rule. Roger Waldron, Counsel at the law firm Mayer Brown, explains.

    July 15, 2010
  • A recently enacted disclosure rule in the Federal Acquisition Regulation has the contracting community rethinking the way it does business. Contractors are now required to report evidence of fraud or overpayments in a timely fashion…

    February 18, 2009