[Federal Register Volume 78, Number 58 (Tuesday, March 26, 2013)]
[Notices]
[Pages 18349-18350]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2013-06856]
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DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
GENERAL SERVICES ADMINISTRATION
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
[OMB Control No. 9000-0136; Docket 2012-0076; Sequence 63]
Federal Acquisition Regulation; Information Collection;
Commercial Item Acquisitions
AGENCY: Department of Defense (DOD), General Services Administration
(GSA), and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
ACTION: Notice of request for comments regarding an extension to an
existing OMB clearance.
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SUMMARY: Under the provisions of the Paperwork Reduction Act, the
Regulatory Secretariat will be submitting to the Office of Management
and Budget (OMB) a request to review and approve an extension of a
previously approved information collection requirement concerning the
clauses and provisions required for use in commercial item
acquisitions.
DATES: Submit comments on or before May 28, 2013.
ADDRESSES: Submit comments identified by Information Collection 9000-
0136, Commercial Item Acquisitions, by any of the following methods:
Regulations.gov: http://www.regulations.gov. Submit
comments via the Federal eRulemaking portal by searching the OMB
control number. Select the link ``Submit a Comment'' that corresponds
with ``Information Collection 9000-0136, Commercial Item
Acquisitions''. Follow the instructions provided at the ``Submit a
Comment'' screen. Please include your name, company name (if any), and
``Information Collection 9000-0136, Commercial Item Acquisitions'' on
your attached document.
Fax: 202-501-4067.
Mail: General Services Administration, Regulatory
Secretariat (MVCB), 1275 First Street NE., Washington, DC 20417. ATTN:
Hada Flowers/IC 9000-0136, Commercial Item Acquisitions.
Instructions: Please submit comments only and cite Information
Collection 9000-0136, Commercial Item Acquisitions, in all
correspondence related to this collection. All comments received will
be posted without change to http://www.regulations.gov, including any
personal and/or business confidential information provided.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Mr. Michael O. Jackson, Procurement
Analyst, Office of Governmentwide Acquisition Policy, GSA (202) 208-
4949 or email at [email protected].
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
A. Purpose
The Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act of 1994 included Title
VIII, entitled Commercial Items. The title made numerous additions and
revisions to both the civilian agency and Armed Service acquisition
statutes to encourage and facilitate the acquisition of commercial
items and services by Federal Government agencies.
To implement these changes, DoD, NASA, and GSA amended the Federal
Acquisition Regulation (FAR) to include several streamlined and
simplified clauses and provisions to be used in place of existing
clauses and provisions. They were designed to simplify solicitations
and contracts for commercial items. Information is used by Federal
agencies to facilitate the
[[Page 18350]]
acquisition of commercial items and services.
Pertinent to this information collection is the FAR provision at
52.212-3, Offeror Representations and Certifications-Commercial Items.
The provision is among the representations and certifications that are
available for completion in the On-line Representation and
Certification Application (ORCA) function of the System for Award
Management (SAM) database. Because an offeror only has to complete
representations and certifications once on an annual basis, with
periodic updates, use of the ORCA function by prospective contractors
decreases the number of responses per respondent per year for purposes
of this information collection. ORCA was developed to eliminate the
administrative burden for contractors of submitting the same
information to various contracting offices, and to establish a common
source for this information to procurement offices across the
Government. Prior to ORCA's implementation, prospective contractors
were required to submit representations and certifications in paper
form for each individual contract award. Using the ORCA function in
SAM, a contractor can enter their representations and certification
information once for use on all Federal contracts. FAR 4.1201(a)
requires prospective contractors to complete electronic annual
representations and certifications in conjunction with required
registration in the Central Contractor Registration (CCR). These
requiremnts are met through functionality in SAM. The ORCA function
reuses data pulled from the CCR function and, in many cases, pre-
populates several of the required representations and certifications
with CCR data. The representations and certifications are effective
until one year from the date of submission or update to the ORCA
function in SAM.
B. Annual Reporting Burden
Because ORCA allows for multiple uses from one entry, i.e., a
contractor can enter their representations and certification
information once a year (with any needed updates) for use on all
Federal contracts, the number of responses per respondent has decreased
from the currently approved number 34 to 4. For purposes of this
information collection, initial entry plus three updates are estimated
as the number of responses per respondent per year, i.e., 4 responses
per respondent. As of May 2012, there were 162,000 vendors registered
in the ORCA function of SAM. For purposes of estimation, the number of
vendors registered in the ORCA function of SAM will serve as the number
of respondents. Data entry by contractors is estimated at 30 minutes
per response. As a result, a downward adjustment is being made to the
estimated annual reporting burden since the notice regarding an
extension to this clearance published in the Federal Register at 75 FR
6668, on February 10, 2010.
Respondents: 162,000.
Responses per Respondent: 4.
Total Responses: 648,000.
Hours per Response: .5.
Total Burden Hours: 324,000.
Obtaining Copies of Proposals: Requesters may obtain a copy of the
information collection documents from the General Services
Administration, Regulatory Secretariat (MVCB), 1275 First Street NE.,
Washington, DC 20417, telephone (202) 501-4755. Please cite OMB Control
No. 9000-0136 regarding Commercial Item Acquisitions in all
correspondence.
Dated: March 20, 2013.
William Clark,
Acting Director, Federal Acquisition Policy, Office of Governmentwide
Acquisition Policy, Office of Acquisition Policy, Office of
Governmentwide Policy.
[FR Doc. 2013-06856 Filed 3-25-13; 8:45 am]
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