Can you speak Government?

In the world of government procurement, if you don’t know the language, you’re out of the loop! Almost everything has an acronym and an abbreviation which are very important to doing business with the government. Here you’ll find a small selection of important acronyms and abbreviations.

GSA- General Services Administration; the GSA oversees and assists with all GSA schedule procurement as well as issuing the schedule contracts.

VSC- Vendor Support Center; the VSC can help contractors with just about any contract related problems. Anything from difficult SIP uploads to questions about modifications.

RFQ- Request for Quotation; this the paperwork put out by the buyer that provides information to the contractor on what the requirements of a bid are.

SIN- Special Item Number; each schedule has a list of SINs that are listed under it. They are nothing more than subcategories of a main large category.

IFF- Industrial Funding Fee; for everything a contractor sells on the GSA schedule, the IFF of .75% is added to the price to cover the cost of GSA doing their job.

FAR- Federal Acquisition Regulation; the law of land for government procurement.

SAM- System for Award Management; to do any work with the government, whether on GSA or not, contractors must be registered in this online system.

FAS- Federal Acquisition Service; as part of the GSA, the FAS has 8 program areas that assist in all parts of acquisition processes, across all types of products and services.

TAA- Trade Agreement Act; all products sold on the GSA must come from a TAA compliant country. This means they signed the Trade Agreement Act.

NAICS- North America Industry Classification System; NAICS codes help you categorize your products and services into an industry standard, making it easier for the government to find our products and services.

Some Popular Acronym Schedules

                LOGWORLD- Logistics Worldwide Schedule 874 V; provides logistics support

MOBIS- Missions Oriented Business Integrated Solutions Schedule 874; provides consulting and training services on all subjects except IT.

PES- Professional Engineering Services Schedule 871; Engineering consulting & prototype assistance. Does not allow for architectural services

TAPS- Temporary Administrative and Professional Staffing Services Schedule 736; admin and basic staffing.

TDRS- Transportation, Delivery, and Relocation Solutions Schedule 48; Air, ground, sea transportation, moving and packing services.