(Editor’s Note. We have reported in the GCA REPORT on several GAO and Inspector General reports criticizing the government’s use of task order contracting, guidance issued by the Office of Federal Procurement and other agencies and some recent cases. So we were glad when we found a recent article addressing the current general provisions of task order contracting that addresses these recent developments in the June 2001 Briefing Papers written by Raymond Fioravanti of the law firm of Epstein Becker and Green, P.C. and have included recent developments that have appeared after the Briefing Papers article was published.)

Since Congress in the Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act (FASA) of 1994 explicitly authorized federal agencies to make multiple award of task and delivery order contracts such contract vehicles have gained in popularity and scope. This contract vehicle allows an agency to award a contract to many and even all offerors competing under a single solicitation. The contract themselves offer contractors only an opportunity to compete against each other for task orders for services or delivery orders for supplies under the contract (we will collectively refer to the orders as task orders or TOs). The competition for these orders are often conducted informally with little oversight or accountability. The frequency and scope of multiple task order contracting for services was increased even further since Congress passed the Clinger-Cohen Act of 1996 that introduced the Government-wide agency contracts (GWACs) that allow any federal agency to acquire information technology services through the awarding agencies. These changes were widely praised as breakthrough innovations that would streamline the unwieldy procurement process.

FASA defines a task order contract as a contract "for services that does not procure or specify a firm quantity of services (other than a minimum or maximum quantity) and that provides for the issuance of orders for the performance of tasks during the period of the contracts." FAR Part 16.5 is the regulation implementing the FASA directive where task and delivery order contracts are the preferred contract vehicle for federal agencies. Generally, the FAR provision on indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity (i.e. task and delivery order contracts) contracts instruct contracting officers, to the "maximum extent possible", to give preference to ID/IQ contracts under a single solicitation for the same or similar supplies and services to two or more sources. The FAR requires task order contracts for "advisory and assistance services" that include management and professional support services for providing studies, analysis, evaluation, engineering or technical services if they will exceed $10 million (including options) and three years.

The regulations provide little opportunity to protest either the award or individual task orders. The FAR allows agencies to reduce the number of contracts to an "efficient" number where there is no limit to the number of awards. Statements of work may be broad enough to permit a wide range of services and supplies to be procured through individual orders.

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