Contractors had their doubts when the General Services Administration sun-setted FedBizOpps, the dated web site where agencies listed federal opportunities. The General Services Administration replaced it with a system called Beta.Sam.gov. According to Alan Chvotkin, executive vice president and counsel at the Professional Services Council, contractors are finding the new system isn’t much better than the old, and in some ways worse.
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The transition of the federal contracting opportunities website from Federal Business Opportunities, better known as FedBizOpps or FBO, to the Contracting Opportunities page of beta.SAM.gov caused concern ahead of the migration and frustration after the move. Three months after the transition finished, the government contracting community’s anger has yet to be assuaged.
Last week, the Professional Services Council—an industry group representing 400 federal contractors—sent a letter to the General Services Administration detailing its members’ concerns and asking for immediate action.
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As some of you may already know, the Federal Business Opportunities website – commonly referred to as “FedBizOpps” or “FBO” – is not going to be around much longer. The site will be decommissioned by November 8th of this year, with the site’s “critical functionality” being moved over to/merged with the System for Award Management (“SAM”) as early as first quarter 2020. However, we are not talking about the same old SAM that contractors may be used to; FBO’s functions will be moved over to a new system at beta.SAM.gov
According to a fact sheet issued by the GSA, “one the transition is complete, beta.SAM.gov will have the same federal business opportunity capabilities that are found today in FBO.gov.” You will still be able to follow contract opportunities, and save searches, but the processes used to do so (and the related terminology) might vary slightly. The new system will also boast some improvements over the old flawed-but-familiar FedBizOpps, including…
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The General Services Administration (GSA) has announced that the Federal Business Opportunities website — commonly referred to as “FedBizOpps.gov” — will be decommissioned “starting on November 8, 2019” and that the website’s “critical functionality will be transitioned into beta.SAM.gov in the first quarter of the 2020 fiscal year.”
This transition will impact virtually every federal government contractor, as FedBizOpps.gov currently serves as the single government-wide point of entry for federal government opportunities over $25,000.
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GSA has posted an announcement of its intention to consolidate the current 24 Multiple Award Schedules (MAS) and release a new single Schedule for product, services, and solutions on October 1, 2019. You can find more information on the GSA’s Interact website including what to expect after the consolidated schedule is released.
On October 1, 2019, GSA will publish the new, consolidated, solicitation on FedBizOpps along with applicable attachments. The FBO package will contain:
You can read more on the GSA Interact website.
GSA has announced recently that FedBizOpps.gov (FBO.gov) will be decommissioned and its critical functionality will be transitioned into beta.SAM.gov on November 8, 2019. GSA has published a fact sheet with important information about the transition. You can access and download the fact sheet here:
The Federal Business Opportunities, or FedBizOpps, website will be shutting down before the end of 2019, as the comprehensive database of government contracting opportunities moves to a new location.
By the end of next year, 10 acquisition-focused websites managed by the General Services Administration will be merged together under the new SAM.gov. Those sites include FedBizOpps, as well as the current System for Award Management, or SAM; the Federal Procurement Data System, FPDS; the grants site Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance, CFDA; Wage Determinations Online, WDOL; Electronic Subcontracting Reporting System, eSRS; the past performance databases, the Federal Awardee Performance and Integrity Information System, FAPIIS; Contractor Performance Assessment Reports System, CPARS; and Past Performance Information Retrieval System, PPIRS; and the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act, FFATA.
“Once the modernization is complete, we will have one homepage with a single sign-on, one powerful search tool, one robust reporting tool and one workspace where users can access the information and tools they need to make, receive and manage federal awards,” according to the new SAM.gov, which is currently in beta.
Three sites have already made the jump: CFDA, WDOL and SAM. The PPIRS site was decommissioned, as its functionality is covered by CPARS.
FedBizOpps is scheduled to make the migration in the first quarter of fiscal 2020—or before the end of the calendar year—along with FPDS and remaining capabilities under the old SAM.gov. Once on the new SAM.gov, the FedBizOpps name will go away, replaced by a section of the site titled “Contract Opportunities.”
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The General Services Administration released two pre-cursors to major acquisitions last week with the release of the draft solicitation for the $8 billion back-office cloud procurement and a request for information to expand the Centers of Excellence initiative.
The Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and GSA launched a major cloud and IT modernization effort by announcing an industry day on Feb. 26 in Washington, D.C.
And the Office of Personnel Management is exploring how to create a central portal for the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program.
These are just a few of the more than 4,700 requests for proposals, RFIs and awards released on FedBizOpps.gov in the week after the partial government shutdown ended, opening up the acquisition floodgates.
Keep reading this article at: https://federalnewsnetwork.com/reporters-notebook/2019/02/gsa-releases-new-it-modernization-rfi-in-post-shutdown-procurement-deluge/
Some users are reporting issues accessing the Federal Business Opportunities website — www.fbo.gov — but it is not clear whether the problems are technical in nature or related to the government shutdown.
Nextgov learned of the issue from readers through email and Twitter.
The FBO site is the portal through which the federal government engages with industry regarding procurements, acquisitions and requests for information, quotes or proposals. Any issue with the FBO site could further complicate the situation for contractors, who are dealing with their own batch of shutdown-related problems. Contracting experts suggest that vendor should submit questions and bids according to previously posted deadlines, even if the contracting agency is shut down.
FBO.gov is operated by the General Services Administration (GSA), which did not respond to questions from Nextgov by press time.
Keep reading this article at: https://www.nextgov.com/cio-briefing/2019/01/users-report-issues-federal-business-opportunities-website/153925/
The General Services Administration (GSA) hopes a new pilot program to increase transparency in a fast track government buying service will lead to more competition, but some government vendors worry it will just produce more legal wrangling.
Over the next year, GSA is going to be publicly releasing data from some buyers in its eBuy system for the first time.
The eBuy system allows agencies to post requests for quotations for specific products and services on GSA schedules. Those requests are then released to vendors based on the special item number associated with the goods or services being sought. Once the bids are entered, the contracting officers can make awards directly, though there is little transparency for those not directly involved in the process.
Over the next year, pilot participants will log awards based on eBuy RFQs on the FedBizOpps website. Those awards will be tagged with the keyword “eBuyPilot.”
Keep reading this article at: https://www.nextgov.com/cio-briefing/2018/10/gsa-hopes-ebuy-transparency-will-lead-more-competition-not-more-protests/152140/
