Government Affairs and Advocacy

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This is a channel that we use to keep members in the loop about the latest policy documents and developments. Our work in advocacy cuts across all areas of expertise and impacts all of our members.

Our Director of Government Affairs & Advocacy, Cynthia Smith, and our Advocacy Manager, Jenna Thoretz, post regular updates so our members are alerted to changes in the sector as they happen. We encourage everyone who joins Connect to become part of this community and to keep up to date with the information shared here. Posts to this community go live on our website, and you may wish to use the anonymous posting option if you have a question to ask here.
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USAID: GSA Uniform Entity Identifier Processing Updates

  • 1.  USAID: GSA Uniform Entity Identifier Processing Updates

    Posted 09-16-2022 05:13

    Dear members:

    In recent weeks, you have asked Humentum various questions about the ongoing challenges with GSA's processing of Uniform Entity Identifier (UEI) requests. We are liaising regularly with USAID - which has been a gracious partner in its willingness to elevate those concerns with OMB and the Civilian Agency Acquisition Council (CAAC) - in order to assist in mitigating the ongoing SAM/UEI issues that implementing partners are experiencing. Here is the status on a few of your greatest concerns and requests: 

    Issue: GSA maintains it presently has a "great" close rate for tickets. It seems, however, that those tickets are closed but not resolved because they auto-close after 5 days. Would GSA consider altering/discontinuing the auto-close feature, since with it applicants are losing their place in the process? 

    Status/Solution: The auto-close of the ticket occurs when there has been no activity on the entity's ticket. Therefore, in order for the ticket to remain open, the entity should comment within it if they have not received a response from FSD. Doing this will restart the ticket back to day 1 instead of closing it.

    ______________

    Issue: Would USAID issue a waiver of the UEI requirement to start projects as long as an entity's application for a UEI is in progress?

    Status/Solution: USAID has recently requested authority from OMB to issue a 30-day (or similar time-bound) waiver to applicable partners. USAID met with OMB as recently as yesterday (September 15, 2022) regarding this request and is awaiting their response. Stay tuned. 
    _______________

    Issue: Despite USAID's/others' requests that GSA expedite UEI applications for implementers working on certain critical programming, some of those "expedited" tickets have still taken many weeks or months to move along in the system, if at all. 

    Status/Solution: Escalations of tickets to GSA do not necessarily speed up the registration process, it moves them to a queue where they are actively worked by the GSA escalation team. There are several reasons why this process may take some time (e.g., NCAGE issues, incorrect or missing documentation provided, lack of response from entities, etc.) so where some escalated tickets are resolved within a week, others may take several weeks due to whatever issues have been identified by the GSA team.

    Please continue to send me your questions, observations, and concerns. 

    Thank you, Cynthia



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    Cynthia Smith
    Director, Government Affairs and Advocacy
    Humentum
    cynthia.smith@humentum.org
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