Andrew Mitton

On Novem­ber 13, 2009 the FAR coun­cil pro­posed new reg­u­la­tions about per­sonal con­flicts of inter­est.  If you help a Fed­eral agency plan acqui­si­tions, develop state­ments of work, eval­u­ate con­tract pro­pos­als, award con­tracts, admin­is­ter con­tracts, ter­mi­nate con­tracts, or deter­mine whether costs are rea­son­able, allo­ca­ble, and allow­able, then you’ll have some work to do.

You’ll be required to screen your employ­ees for per­sonal con­flicts of inter­est, get finan­cial dis­clo­sure forms from them, get updates on the dis­clo­sures, get non-disclosure agree­ments, imple­ment con­trols for non-public gov­ern­ment infor­ma­tion, and instruct employ­ees of their oblig­a­tions.  The biggest require­ment is to avoid even the appear­ance of a per­sonal con­flicts of interest.

If the con­trac­tor dis­cov­ers a con­flict, they’re required to report it to the con­tract­ing offi­cer who will decide whether to develop a mit­i­ga­tion plan, pro­vide a waiver, or sus­pend the con­tract, ter­mi­nate the con­tract for default, or debar the contractor.

Pro­posed Reg­u­la­tion — FAR Case 2008-025 Pre­vent­ing Per­sonal Con­flicts of Inter­est for Con­trac­tor Employ­ees Per­form­ing Acqui­si­tion Functions