How often has a CO heard that! In some cases, it can be true and that is usually when the government itself has caused delays because of their failure to act in a timely manner.
Government caused delays can occur in many ways. For example, on a services contract, delays may occur because facilities or funding was late, causing the government to postpone the need for personnel on the contract. In the case of hardware production type contracts, delays may be caused by late delivery of Government-furnished components or test equipment necessary to complete production.
When you make an offer on an RFP, make sure that your company is aware of the potential for delays. Funding is the one item that is really hard for anyone to control as the government can be its own worst enemy with its budget/funding process. Many organizations now provide the contractor with a PC and access to its systems. Look at how fast the government can get people a seat if the support is to be embedded with the customer. In research or production contracts, if there is a schedule of events (i.e., delivery of items, test events), determine if the contract contains overly optimistic completion dates and be aware of those risks in your proposal or point them out to the CO during the proposal period.
What should you do when you think the government has caused an impact to the schedule and your cost? First and most important, NOTIFY the CO!!!! Failure to communicate will make the problem worse not better. Remember the CO is not involved in many cases with the daily operations of the contract, especially on service contracts. Now the Contracting Officer Representative (COR) or the Technical Point of Contact (TPoC) should also communicate the delay but do not rely on them to inform the CO.
When you’re are facing delays, it is imperative that you capture cost and days lost on the production schedule as a result of the government delay. If you were depending on government funding for payroll and your people are delayed in starting that becomes an issue for your company. Some companies may have the cash reserves to cover payroll, but it can impact your ability to hold onto people if your company can’t meet payroll. Informing the contracting office of the details of the cost impacts will be required so capturing that data from the start may speed up resolution. The CO will not act if he doesn’t have the details of the cost impact.
If there is an impact to schedule, that too must be accounted for and explained. If certain components and/or equipment is to be provided and it arrives late, that can impact schedule. Many companies will claim that there is no impact because they don’t want to deliver bad news, I think because the company worries that delays will always be viewed as the contractor’s fault. I say that is a risky approach and if you document the delays with the CO they are on notice of that situation. Companies may take on the challenge of trying to overcome schedule delays without asking for an adjustment in the delivery schedule. Make sure you let the government know up front that you are taking that risk, which will help later if the schedule does slip and the delivery date is missed. Claiming after the fact that there was government cause will make the contract modification that much harder. Get in front of the problem!