Friends in high places
19 November 2007A US-based service manager, who has received business from government tenders for eight years (three with his current company) was enraged when he discovered Hoist was publishing US government contract information. "It is a trade secret that keeps some of us in business," he fumed. Do you agree?
Since 2001, following a successful pilot scheme launched in 1999, FedBizOpps.gov has been the single government point-of-entry for US federal government procurement opportunities over $25,000.
Hoist publishes the latest public-sector business opportunities available in the USA and Canada, the European Union and Japan live on its website. This information is also circulated to the industry in a fortnightly newsletter.
The service manager, who would rather remain anonymous, added: "Most companies are afraid of the government arena and fear a lack of payment on jobs. The rumour in the States is that the government holds up payments for messing up paperwork."
In fact, in his experience, if someone is trained correctly, payment can be in 12 days, rather than 45 to 60 or even 90 from the automotive industry, for example.
It can be a competitive marketplace though. Large businesses have been accused of representing themselves as small companies or even pushing contracts through a smaller business.
The service manager says that around 20% of his current business comes from tenders and without them the company would "still be stuck in the dead automotive market in Detroit."
Job stories are hard to come by with most of the contracts being deemed classified or carried out "behind close doors."
Another source says: "The environment is clean as compared to factory work and the people are friendly. We as contractors sleep at the base hotels, eat at their restaurants, exercise on their equipment, and use the recreational facilities. Although new equipment installations are great, I personally enjoy the inspection and upgrade work."
The beauty of tenders is that there is a steady stream of work.
Tenders do not always reflect the state of business at that given time. The US government operates to a fiscal year, which starts on October 1. It means they "shop" all spring and summer before issuing contracts in the fall.
Usually, by December or January the work slows down considerably. One source says: "Our busy government season is always October through December."
Government buyers are able to publicise their business opportunities by posting information directly to FedBizOpps via the internet.
Through one portal, FedBizOpps (FBO), commercial vendors seeking federal markets for their products and services can search, monitor and retrieve opportunities solicited by the entire federal contracting community.
In order to post documents to FBO using the email or FTP interface, a federal buyer organisation needs to follow the following steps:
- Develop software that will generate emails or FTP files with records in proper FBO template format out of its procurement system. Systems that previously submitted records to CBDNet may be employed with or without minor modifications (FBO is backward compatible with CBDNet).
- Contact FBO administrator at fbo.support@gsa.gov for user authority (user ID and password) and for the email address and URL (uniform resource locator) of the FBO test server.
- Send test messages for each type of template.
- Validate results on FBO test server.
- Notify FBO administrator when test is complete and schedule a switch over to the FBO production system.
Categories of most relevance to the crane industry are numbered 39 (materials handling equipment) and 40 (rope, cable, chain and fittings).
Do you apply for government tenders? What are the pros and cons?
Keep in touch,
Richard Howes, Editor
