The Defense procurement director — commenting on behalf of the undersecretary for acquisition, technology and logistics — partially concurred with the recommendations but stated plans to issue a policy memorandum to address most of the recommendations, according to the audit.
The director also said his office would work with NASA to add language to the website for the SEWP contracts addressing the remaining recommendations.
Navy acquisition officials disagreed that researching potential contracts should be DoD-wide and stated plans to limit research to command-available contracts and other known contracts, something that prompted the auditors to request additional comments.
Air Force acquisition officials partially agreed with the report, and though they emphasized more controls on program officials, auditors stated that contracting officers should sign off on documents explaining the reasoning for using a non-DoD contract.
Auditors also said procedures for contracting officers should be discussed in the Air Force guidebook.
The Defense Information Systems Agency also did not fully meet the intent of the recommendations with its plans, auditors said.
The report stated that while the Defense IT Contracting Organization’s procurement director said additional Economy Act training would be provided, he did not address training on the use of non-DoD contracts not under the act and training procedures to properly execute the agency’s policy for using non-DoD contracts.
