Terms and Conditions Order of Precedence

Submitted by Brad deMers on Monday, March 10, 2014 - 4:48 PM

As Contracting Officers, achieving 100% accuracy with no inconsistencies is always our intent when negotiating and awarding contractual agreements. However, we are all human and therefore imperfect. We have successfully utilized the following type of language in our RFQs and awards to hedge against said imperfection. For your convenience, this language is also housed in our document section titled “Terms and Conditions Order of Precedence Document.” As always, when it comes to adding terms and conditions to any contractual document, you should seek the advice of legal counsel before proceeding.

Terms and Conditions

This Task Order is subject to the terms and conditions provided in the Contractor’s (state the contract vehicle and number e. g. FSS MOBIS GS-10F-XXXXX ) Contract award as well as those outlined in this Task Order. The Government hereby incorporates (by reference) the Contractor's Original and Revised (if applicable, if not delete revised) Quote. In the event of an inconsistency between documents, the following order of precedence shall apply:

1. (State contract name and number e.g. MOBIS CONTRACT GS-10F-XXXXX)

2. Task Order Statement of Work

3. Task Order Attachments, drawings, etc. associated with the Statement of Work

4. Contractor's Task Order Quote

NOTE: In the event of a discrepancy between the Contractor's Task Order Quote and any of the aforementioned Contract/Task Order documents, the Contract and Task Order language shall take precedence. In particular, only in extremely rare circumstances can the language in a task order supercede the language in the basic Schedule contract. Any such instance shall be clearly indicated in the resulting task order award.

Betterments, if any, in the Contractor's Task Order Quote which exceed the minimum performance requirements identified in the Task Order Statement of Work and associated documents shall be considered the new "minimum" performance requirements upon award and shall be met by the Contractor.

Tags:

best practices

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Professional Services Category

Views: 12035

Comments

Brad deMers

In response to the above blog post, we received some excellent questions offline: Q. What happens when the FSS contractor receives an FSS contract price increase?  Based on your order of precedence does this mean the prices will automatically increase for the Task Order? A.  No, not necessarily.  Unless price adjustments in the Task Order based on future FSS contract price adjustments are explicitly agreed to in the Task Order, then the Task Order prices remain as agreed to in the Order.   Q. What about NAICS and size (recertification) at the Order level done <a href="http://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text-idx?SID=32b37fd4877c34370dacc41c9ce1e196&node=13:1.0.1.1.17.1.270.19&rgn=div8" style="line-height: 1.15; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">IAW 13 CFR §121.404 (a)(1)(iii)?</a> The results of a size recertification at the order level could clearly be different than the size determined at the contract level.A. As allowed by <a href="http://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text-idx?SID=32b37fd4877c34370dacc41c9ce1e196&node=13:1.0.1.1.17.1.270.19&rgn=div8" style="text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">13 CFR §121.404 (a)(1)(iii) </a>the Ordering Activity  contracting officer may require a size recertification at the Order level.  This is one of those “rare circumstances” Brad Powers mentioned in his comment.  In this case, the size determination at the Order level would take precedence over the size determination at the FSS Contract level.

Posted 03/10/2014 6:55 PM

Brad Powers

Well, it looks like we hit the mainstream on this one.  For those of you who subscribe to the Virtual Acquisition Office (VAO) newsletter, you will see this post highlighted today (March 10. 2014).  Unfortunately, the title of their article states this is a "GSA Clause" which is most definitely not the case.  Unless we specifically cite a law, regulation or policy, what we are posting here is always just a best practice.  This is merely some language we have used within our own team on task orders and is most definitely NOT meant to be GSA policy nor is it a statement of GSA policy.  In fact, I wouldn't be at all surprised if other contracting officers, policy analysts and even legal counsel within GSA might not agree with the suggested language contained within this post.  From our perspective, that is a good thing!  The whole point of this blog is to share best practices for buying professional services.  We have always welcomed and even actively encouraged dissenting opinions.  If there was a "right answer" to what we are posting, we would be citing the legal or regulatory basis for that answer.  Most importantly, if someone reading this knows of a "right answer" we missed then let us know!In fact, we have already received some offline feedback that led us to clarify some of the language in the post with more clarifications on the way.  In particular, Brad deMers will be posting some of the "rare circumstances" where a task order might actually supersede the basic contract terms and conditions.  Hint:  Think set asides and size recertification.  More to come...and thank you for reading our blog!-Brad P.

Posted 03/10/2014 4:31 PM

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