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The proposed guideline might suggest that small companies would need to have one employee invest three months a year just entering information. Remember, this is data the federal government already has however does not gather centrally. While I am all in favor of creating jobs, I do not believe forcing little services to hire workers to offer information a 2nd time is a beneficial usage of their dollars or tax dollars, due to the fact that someone has actually got to pay for this.
Data is not complimentary. Businesses will decide it is much better to offer separately of GSA, which will enhance the government's cost to purchase, or the small companies will drop out of the federal market altogether, decreasing competitors. In fact, we have actually already lost over 100 little professionals in the past two years.
I look forward to speaking with our witnesses today about the results of GSA's proposed rule and any option they would recommend to improve how the government buys whatever it purchases. I now accept the ranking member for his opening declaration. Mr. TAKAI. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and excellent morning.
The GSA schedules have a variety of benefits for both vendors and purchasing companies. Most notably, it produces a simpler system that enables contracting officers direct access to the services and products of numerous firms without the need of releasing numerous solicitations for every requirement. For little businesses with limited resources, relative inexperience browsing the procurement procedure, landing on a GSA schedule can be an essential initial step towards protecting the federal government as a client.
The rule requires that firms that hold schedule contracts while other government-wide acquisition agreements report transactional data through an electronic system. While it appears that much of this information is currently readily available to the GSA, the new rule increases the frequency of reporting and expands what info companies are required to supply. GSA Search Engine Ranker Services.
With that, I thank the witnesses for affirming today, and I yield back. Chairman HANNA. Thank you. If Committee members have an opening statement, I ask that they be submitted for the record. And as you understand, you have 5 minutes. We desire to hear what you state, so we will be a little bit-- I will be a little bit flexible on that, or attempt to be.
What the rule requires is month-to-month reports from a range of GSA professionals. This includes both the schedule contractors, as well as those who hold IDIQ, indefinite shipment, indefinite amount specialists, and what we call GWACs, Government-wide Acquisition Agreements, to prepare these regular monthly reports of all federal sales made during the prior month.
For those professionals who participate in the pilot program, they will be eased from a problem, what we call the rate decreases stipulation, which is another compliance stipulation that remains in GSA contracts. In the general public conference that GSA hung on April 17th, I participated in practically. My perception of that meeting is that everybody in the room had issues about the rule, including GSA's own inspector general.
The proposed guideline raises a range of concerns (GSA Search Engine Ranker). The first, which I am sure you will hear from all our panel members about, is the expense of execution and compliance.
I would recommend that for some contractors, it will take six hours for them to determine which of their IT systems hold the different data elements that GSA has actually needed for this rule. That does not enable at any time for developing a report, ensuring that the report is precise, and training its personnel on how they will send that report on a monthly basis.
This might not perhaps permit at any time for the professionals to really review the reports to ensure that the information is appropriate. There is absolutely nothing in the proposed guideline that suggests what would occur if the specialists submit inaccurate information or if they simply eliminate data because it is obviously incorrect.
The second troublesome area is the potential expansion of what we call business sales practice requirements. GSA contractors are needed to submit industrial sales practices prior to contract award and throughout contract performance when particular things occur, like if they go to add items to a contractor's increased rates. The proposed guideline enables GSA to ask for CSPs at any time (GSA Search Engine Ranker Services).
This requires professionals to go into their data systems and take a look at real discount rates on transactions. I suggest, we see news release after press release from the Department of Justice mentioning that contractors have fraudulently offered this details when in reality they simply have actually not checked. This is a big concern.
We understand it is going to cost a lot to gather the information, however what is unclear is what benefit GSA is going to receive from the info. And after that finally, is the personal and proprietary nature of the information. Transactional information prices has constantly been safeguarded by the courts under FOIA, and GSA does not appear to appreciate based on comments made at the conference that this is the case.
GSA recognizes the extra reporting requirement will certainly have a cost for afflicted businesses. SBA's Workplace of Advocacy and GSA's own inspector basic noted that estimates in the proposed guideline appear dramatically understated.
Intricacy, on the other hand, measures if a policy change will make selling to the federal government harder or easier. Basically, will the federal market be basically challenging to comprehend? Or as I frequently speak with organization owners, am I going to require to hire somebody for this? While GSA contents its reporting solution will be user- friendly, our experience is that federal government data systems are anything however - GSA Search Engine Ranker Software.
Often, however, small organizations provide tailored and innovative solutions that in combination with competitive rates produce finest value in procurement instead of least expensive price. While GSA recommends that pricing will just be one element in identifying finest value, it provides significant weight. The words "price" or "prices" appear 165 times in the regulation, while "finest worth" only appears 7.
This resembles asking retailers selling on Amazon to report to Amazon what it offered on Amazon. This seems to be an inefficient way to gather information. Finally, and speaking with the chauffeur behind this policy, we continue to be concerned about a vision of federal government procurement that seeks to classify personalized services into narrow categories.
I more than happy to answer any questions. Chairman HANNA. Thank you, Mr. Stanford. Next, we have Mr. Roger Waldron, who is president of the Coalition of Government Procurement. Think it or not, we have time. We can break now but I think we do have time to survive. As you can see, there are 400 people who have not shown up yet.
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