FEDERAL CONTRACTORS: Better Performance Information Needed to Support Agency Contract Award Decisions
Abstract
In fiscal year 2007, federal agencies worked with over 160,000 contractors, obligating over $456 billion, to help accomplish federal missions. This reliance on contractors makes it critical that agencies have the information necessary to properly evaluate a contractors prior history of performance and better inform agencies contract award decisions. While actions have been taken to improve the sharing of past performance information and its use- including the development of the Past Performance Information Retrieval System (PPIRS)- concerns remain about this information. This report assesses agencies use of past performance information in awarding contracts; identifies challenges that hinder systematic sharing of past performance information; and describes efforts to improve contractor performance information. In conducting this work, GAO analyzed 62 contract solicitations from fiscal years 2007 and 2008 and met with 121 contracting officials. While the solicitations represent a range of contracts and contractors, GAOs findings cannot be generalized to all federal contracts. GAO is making recommendations to the Office of Federal Procurement Policy and selected agencies aimed at facilitating sharing and use of past performance information. All agencies agreed with the recommendations.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Apr 01, 2009
- Accession Number
- AD1178967
Entities
People
- Ann C. Barr
- Anne-marie Lasowski
- Barry Deweese
- Bradley Terry
- Flavio Martinez
- James Fuquay
- Jeffrey Barron
- Julia Kennon
- Karen Sloan
- Susan Neill
- Sylvia Schatz
- Usman Ahmad
Organizations
- United States Government Accountability Office