NASA Property

Improving Management of Government Equipment Provided to Contractors Gao ID: NSIAD-93-191 September 9, 1993

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has provided its contractors with billions of dollars worth of government property for them to use in research and development, production, and service contracts. The value of government property, especially general purpose equipment, provided to contractors has soared in recent years, despite government policies designed to minimize this practice. This report determines (1) NASA's compliance with federal regulations intended to minimize the amount of government-owned, contractor-held general purpose equipment; (2) the effectiveness of government and contractor controls over equipment; and (3) the adequacy of NASA's reporting of this equipment.

GAO found that: (1) NASA has not complied with federal acquisition regulations (FAR) to lessen the amount of government-owned, contractor-held equipment; (2) NASA routinely provides general purpose equipment to contractors, but it does not provide adequate oversight and approval of contractors' acquisitions; (3) NASA has improperly included contractor-acquired equipment in its determination of some contractors' fees; (4) NASA inadequately trains its procurement and program personnel in property issues and regulations, provides limited guidance from headquarters, and fails to involve property specialists in the procurement process; (5) NASA controls over contractors' acquisition, use, and reporting of general purpose equipment are inadequate; (6) government property administrators do not adequately determine whether government-provided equipment is appropriate or acquisitions are properly authorized by NASA contracting officers and comply with FAR regulations; (7) NASA cannot be sure that contractors' property reports are reliable, since Department of Defense (DOD) agencies do not adequately review the detailed information supporting the contractors' reports or provide NASA with the results of the analyses; and (8) inconsistencies between NASA and contractor records hamper reconciliations.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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