A spokesperson for the General Services Administration (GSA) told MeriTalk today that more than 100 agencies have signed on to extend their current set of telecommunications contracts for an additional year, and of those, 48 have completed the process.
Earlier this year, GSA decided to invoke Continuity of Service clauses for expiring enterprise network and telecommunications contracts. This gave agencies an additional year to either complete their transition to Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions (EIS) or find another solution to prevent interruption of services.
GSA gave agencies until September 30 to sign a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to extend their expiring network and telecommunications contracts, while they transition to the EIS program.
“In early August, GSA received and countersigned 25 MOUs, and we sent a list of those agencies to the Networx, WITS, and EIS contractors for their awareness and to facilitate their interaction with those agencies,” the spokesperson told MeriTalk. “To date, we have a total of 48 signed MOUs. Next week we will again share that updated list with the contractors for their planning purposes.”
Of the 116 agencies with active services on the expiring contracts, GSA has heard from all but five agencies regarding their intent to sign the MOU.
“We are redoubling efforts to reach those five and are sending periodic reminders to all agencies that haven’t yet returned their signed MOUs that they need to do so by Sept. 30,” the spokesperson said.
The transition has been slow for many agencies. Laura Stanton, the assistant commissioner for the Office of Information Technology Category in GSA’s Federal Acquisition Service, wrote in a blog that as of June 30 agencies have awarded 94 percent of all planned task orders.
“We urge agencies to push toward completing 100 percent disconnection of services by Sept. 30 and assess their risk of not completing the transition by May 30, 2023. Those who need more time to transition must sign an MOU to be authorized to use the continuity of service period from June 1, 2023, to May 31, 2024,” she wrote.
