FIAR

On April 30, 2015, the House Armed Services Committee passed H.R. 1735, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year (“FY”) 2016, with an amendment (Log #325rl) that could shape how the Department of Defense (“DoD”) acquires audit and audit readiness services for its Financial Improvement and Audit Readiness (“FIAR”) Plan. Under the FIAR Plan, DoD must validate the audit readiness of its financial statements by September 30, 2017, and it must submit to Congress an audit of its FY 2018 financial books by March 31, 2019. The amendment states that, for DoD to meet these deadlines, “it is imperative that [DoD] not sacrifice contracts with firms who have the proper credentials and expertise” to provide DoD with audit and audit readiness services. Hence, the amendment bars the use of a lowest-price, technically-acceptable (“LPTA”) evaluation method to procure such services unless DoD (1) establishes “the values and metrics for the services being procured, including domain expertise and experience, size and scope of [an] offeror’s team, personnel qualifications and certifications, technology, and tools”; and (2) considers offerors’ past performance history.
Continue Reading An Acceptable Proposal: Set Appropriately High, Clear Standards for DoD’s Auditors and LPTA Competitions