Before awarding any contract of $10 million or more (excluding construction contracts and other contracts that may be exempt), the contracting officer must request the appropriate OFCCP regional office to conduct a compliance review of the supplier’s employment practices, and those of all known first-tier subcontractors with subcontracts of $10 million or more, except when a compliance review has been conducted within 12 months prior to award. Whenever possible, preaward review requests must be submitted at least 30 days before the anticipated award date. Oral requests must be confirmed in writing. This requirement applies to a modification of an existing contract that increases its value to $10 million or more, a contract modification constituting a new purchase of $10 million or more, a letter contract, and an indefinite-delivery contract or ordering agreement (OA) under which orders are expected to aggregate $10 million or more.
The contracting officer must include the following information in the preaward request:
If the OFCCP has not made a final preaward determination within 30 days from submission of the request, the contracting officer must withhold award of the contract for an additional 15 days, or until clearance is received, whichever occurs first. If the additional 15 days expire, and the OFCCP has neither found the supplier to be in compliance nor made a final written determination declaring the supplier ineligible for reasons of noncompliance, the award may be made. The contracting officer must notify the OFCCP regional office of the award.
These procedures do not apply when the VP, SM, finds that the procedures would delay an urgent or critical award or delay an award beyond the time specified for acceptance of a proposal. In such cases, the contracting officer must inform the director, OFCCP, requesting a postaward review.
