The General Services Administration (“GSA”) currently operates 24 Multiple Award Schedules (“MAS”), under which it awards largely pre-negotiated contracts on largely commercial-item terms for a dizzying array of products and services. The current schedules are organized by industry or type of service, with individual schedules covering areas both broad (Schedule 70, IT procurement), narrow (Schedule 78, sports equipment, signs and trophies), and potentially duplicative (Schedule 71, furniture/Schedule 72, furnishings and floor coverings). The GSA recently announced that it will abolish this fractured landscape. Rather than maintain its current 24 MAS rubrics as separate entities, GSA announced it will consolidate all 24 into a single schedule. Stephanie Shutt, the Director of GSA’s MAS Program Management Office, described this change as part of a “mass reform project” to “ensure MAS is easy, efficient, and modern.” This announcement impacts all contractors with this type of schedule contract and will dramatically alter the process by which contractors apply for and government stakeholders purchase from GSA schedules.
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