WILLIAMSBURG, Va.-A substantial portion of the federal government's big procurements soon will be accessible through a single World Wide Web site being developed by the General Services Administration.
Unlike previous efforts to create a single point of contact for federal buyers and their would-be suppliers, the Electronic Posting System (EPS) at www.eps.gov seems to be winning the support and participation of most major agencies, both Defense and civilian. Developer Paul Fontaine of GSA's Office of Governmentwide Policy says commitments are close at hand from agencies that do about 90 percent of the government's buying.
Agencies not only post notices of their buying intentions on the Web site but also can make available all the procurement documents for download by vendors. When a subsystem being developed by the Air Force is added onto the site, vendors also will be able to deliver proposals to agencies securely.
The site has been in development for more than two years. GSA has worked with NASA, the Transportation Department, the Air Force and other agencies to build it. Most recently, Fontaine said, the Treasury Department and its 14 bureaus signed an agreement to use the site. Agencies can either post their solicitations on EPS or link their Web sites to it.
Because EPS has a flexible, modular architecture, it will interoperate seamlessly with CBDnet, the Web site that publishes Commerce Business Daily notices; the FACNET electronic commerce network; and agencies' existing procurement sites. Eps.gov will be a portal for accessing the information on these sites.
Although Fontaine has done little marketing to inform the public about the Electronic Posting System, more than 28,000 vendors have begun using the system to locate sales opportunities. They can sign up to receive e-mail advisories whenever a solicitation is posted in their business category. For example, a paint store could be notified each time an agency seeks to buy paint. The system already is generating some 300,000 such e-mails every day.
Vendors need not fill out elaborate registration forms nor pay to use the Web site, but the secure operations will require them to obtain registration certificates. Once the secure subsystem is in place, the military services and other agencies with classified procurements can exchange information with approved vendors. For example, military buyers do not make public the specifications for advanced weapons systems.
Demonstrating the posting system at GSA's annual IRMCO conference here, Fontaine said it will undergo reviews in the next few months and may be designated by the Office of Federal Procurement Policy as the official "single entry point" for federal procurements valued at more than $25,000. Next year, he said, it may be linked to the systems for posting federal grant opportunities on the Web, becoming a single point of access for many more billions of dollars worth of grants and acquisitions.
Agencies will pay fees for the use of the site and the software now that it is moving out of its pilot stage, but Fontaine said that "it's cheaper than anything else they've been considering."
NEXT STORY: TSP's C Fund slides some more