Awards

An Overview of Awards

In CLM Purchasing, an award is the result of a requisition to solicitation to award flow, however there are also scenarios where an award is made directly from a requisition containing the committed funding. You can create an award from a requisition using the Document Builder (Demand Workbench). Another award creation scenario: Information contained in the requisition document, along with accumulated data from a solicitation, is copied and reused in the award document. For example, requisition lines may be copied and moved to a solicitation document and, after completion of negotiations, copied and moved once again to the award without substantial change to the contents of the original line in the requisition. In cases where an award follows a solicitation using the Sourcing module, the authoring of the award is a straightforward process in that the terms and conditions and requirements are much the same as for the solicitation, and the award price will be derived from the offer submitted by the selected supplier. The award or solicitation could vary significantly from the original requirements on the requisition document. Based on the dollar amount of the anticipated award, approvals would need to follow for the award document itself.

In CLM, the following award types are created when there is no reference to an IDV (source document number):

The following award types are created when you need to refer to an IDV (source document number):

Creating an Award

You can create Awards in CLM in various ways:

Note: Please note that when awards are closed after partial receipt or invoicing, the remaining unfulfilled quantities will not be recreated as new demand in requisitions.

In Buyer Work Center, the Awards page consists of a header, addresses and vendor details, line(s), schedules and distributions.

Preferences Page

As a user, you can specify the office address and contracts that you want to default on the Address and Supplier Details page. Using the options on the Preferences page, select values for the different office addresses and contacts. This enables you to save on data-entry time and effort, because the office addresses and contacts values that you specify in the Preferences page default on each document you create.

Click the Preferences link located at the top of the page to view and edit the default values that will appear on the award. The CLM Preferences (Office and Contacts defaults) link opens a region that enables you to select the Location and Contact for an Office Type (COTR Office, Payment Office, Issuing Office etc.). The selected master data defaults on the award in the Address and Supplier Details tab. You can change the values of the defaulted data on the specific award. This data on the award is retained, even if the preference settings change at a later point of time.

Document Styles

Use the Document Styles window to create and update purchasing document styles. Purchasing document styles allow organizations to control the look and feel of the application to match the usage of the purchasing document. Through reusable document styles, organizations can turn on or off various Oracle Purchasing features, thereby simplifying the user interface. In addition, document styles provide the ability to define purchasing document names that align more closely with the naming conventions of your organization's business. When a purchasing document is created using a document style, disabled features are hidden. You can see the document styles with respect to FAR purchases in the Document Styles page.

Note: Document styles only apply to authoring documents in the Buyer Work Center. Document styles are not organization specific.

Define document styles using the Setup > Purchasing > Document Styles page. For more information on setting up document styles in CLM, please refer to the Oracle Contract Lifecycle Management for Public Sector Implementation Guide.

Award Header

Navigate to Awards tab in Buyer Work Center. The Header sub-tab is displayed, where you can see the summary View region. A listing of awards with some of their details is displayed in the View region based on the default view. You can see all the awards to which you have access. For example, if you wish to see your Incomplete Awards, or your Approved Awards, you need to select the appropriate view. You can personalize your views as well. In order to change the emphasis of the summary view, click Headers, Lines, Schedules, Pay Items, or Distributions sub-tabs and the summary views will change accordingly.

Note: Please note that modifications to awards display in a separate sub-tab under the main Awards tab.

Views are predefined searches for awards. To use a view, select the view from the View list and click Go. Use the following pre-defined views to search for awards:

Click Export to export the entire results of the search results (that is, the view). The results can be saved or viewed in a comma delimited file format. For example, select the My Approved Awards view and then click Export. The Export functionality saves all your approved award information in a comma separated values file, which can be opened as an MS-Excel spreadsheet.

Using Search

Search for an award by clicking the Search button on the Header page. The Search page displays with some search criteria such as Award, Supplier, Buyer, and Approval Status. Additionally, you can add more search criteria fields by using the Add Another LOV. Some of the search criteria fields that you can use are: Operating Unit, Creation Date, Effective Date, Priority Code, Issuing Office, COTR Office Address, COTR Office Contact Name, etc. You can search by opting to meet all or any of the conditions that you set the values for. The search results display in the region below and you can select an award to perform an action, such as updating the award, deleting the award, creating a modification, viewing the PDF.

Actions

You can perform actions on the awards that are listed in the view page or the search results page. For example, if the selected award has a status of Incomplete, some of the actions you can perform on the award are: Delete, Update, Place on Hold, Duplicate with Attachments, Duplicate without Attachments, View PDF, View Requisitions. Depending on the status of the award, the different actions are displayed in the Select Award LOV. Select an action from the LOV and click Go.

Regions in the Awards Header

When you select an award style from the Create LOV and click Go, the Create Award page displays, with the header tab highlighted. Enter the award header information in this tab. The award header contains all the general information that applicable to the award. The award header tab consists of several regions such as the main region, Terms region, Business Priority and Project Information region, Competitive Information region, Attachments region and Standard Form-specific regions (such as SF1442 or SF252, depending on what you have selected in the Standard Form LOV).

Given below is a description of the FAR fields. For an explanation of non-FAR fields, please refer to the Oracle Purchasing User's Guide.

Main region

Terms region

Business Priority and Project Information region

Award Categorization region

Competitive Information region

The fields in this region provide information as to whether this award is set aside for a specific disadvantaged business.

SF1442 Information region

The fields in this region provide information that is specific to the SF1442 (Construction Contract). The fields will only display with the form SF1442 is selected and used.

SF252 Information region

Attachments

The Attachments region enables you to attach various kinds of files to the award header – including the ability to annotate the award with a note. Click Add Attachment to open the Add Attachment page and specify the kind of attachment you would like to use: Desktop File/Text/URL or From Document Catalog.

  1. Select a Category from the list of values. The Category defines the purpose of an attachment, and controls which forms or pages can access it.

  2. Select the attachment Type:

    • File - specify a file name to upload. Enter the file location, or use the Browse button to locate the file.

    • URL - enter the URL for a Web page.

    • Text - Enter text that is less than 2000 characters. If the text you want to attach is more than 2000 characters, upload it in a file.

  3. From the Document Catalog:

    • Use the Search regions to query existing documents.

    • Select the Document Name link to view a document before attaching it.

    • Select the document(s) to attach.

    • Click Apply.

Save your work in the application page from which you launched the attachments flow. The attachments are not added until you save your work in the parent region.

To view an attached document

In the Attachments page or Attachments table, select the File Name link.

If the attachment is a URL, the Web page will launch. If the attachment is a file, a dialog box prompts you to open or save the file. If the attachment is text, the View Attachment page displays the text content.

To edit an attachment

  1. Display the Attachments page or Attachments table.

  2. Select the Update icon.

  3. In the Update Attachment page, edit only the information as it pertains to the attachment. For example, you can update the URL for a Web page attachment, but you cannot change it to a File attachment.

  4. Select the Apply button.

  5. Return to the application page from which you launched the attachments flow and save your work.

    Note: Attachment updates must be saved in the associated parent region.

Copying Attachments

When using Document Builder, for each requisition line copied, the corresponding header level attachment is copied. For example, a requisition with 3 lines has 3 line level attachments and a header level attachment. Then AutoCreate this requisition to an award with 3 lines, each of the 3 lines in the award would have the specific line attachment and the common header attachment.

Address and Supplier Details

The Address and Supplier Details tab enables you to select Office Types, Locations and Contacts that need to be associated to the award. This information will often default from the user preferences or previous documents in the process, and can be changed / updated by you any time prior to approval. When the award is approved, this data on the award may not be changed / updated, except through a modification. Even if the master data changes over a period of time, the data that is stored as part of the award does not change. For example, an Issuing Office location is changed after 2 years after the approval of an award. The value of the fields in the award which used that office location will not change to the new office location value, it will retain the original location values which existed at the time of approving the award.

Each address row consists of the following information: Address Details, Address Type, Location Address Code and Contact.

Supplier Details region in the Address and Supplier Details tab

The Supplier Details region enables you to enter and view additional supplier information. Some of the important fields in this region are:

If you update the award information prior to final approval, this information is updated if the master data changes. When the award is approved, this information doesn’t change even if the master data changes over a period of time.

Award Lines

Click on the Lines tab to search for specific award lines. You can search by Supplier, Buyer, Item or Category. Additionally, you can add more search criteria fields to your search by selecting the fields from the Add Another LOV. Some of the fields you can search on are: Approval Date, Buyer, Description, Document Style, FSC/PSC, MDAPS/MAIS, NAICS, Operating Unit, etc. Select one or more additional fields from the Add Another LOV and click Add. Enter values for the fields you selected and click Go. The search results display in the region below and you can click on an award number link or a line number link to view the award or line details. Alternatively, select an award using the Select radio button and perform actions such as Update Award, Update Line, Close for Invoice, Close for Receiving, View Invoices, View Payments, View Requisitions, etc. Select Update Award or Update Line actions if you need to update the award or line.

Every award line is automatically numbered, however you can change the numbering of a line. The Contract Line (CLIN) and Sub-line (SLIN) structure is used in all CLM purchasing documents, including modifications and amendments to the purchasing documents. A Contract Line captures information about the item(s) or service(s) to be procured in the contract with or without the pricing details. Thus, a Contract Line (CLIN) can be a priced line or an informational line. Similarly, Sub-Lines, which are used to capture additional information about the CLIN, can be priced sub-lines or informational sub-lines.

CLIN numbers are always 4 digit numeric values that fall in the range 0001-9999. Duplicate numbers are not supported by the system and an error message displays if a duplicate number is found. A segment with 4 digit numeric values from 0001 – 9999 is defined for each document. The numbers are sequentially generated.

SLINS are sub-lines that use a 6-character numbering format – numeric or alphanumeric. The first 4 digits of the SLINs are populated with the parent CLIN number. The next 2 digits are automatically generated, based on whether the SLIN is a Priced sub-line or an Informational sub-line. SLIN numbers cannot be updated by you. If the SLIN is Informational, the last 2 digits are always numeric values in the range 01-99. If the SLIN is Priced, the last 2 digits are always alphabetical values ranging from AA to ZZ (except the alphabets I and O which are not used in number generation at all).

For more information on the guidelines that govern the numbering of purchasing document lines, please refer to the Appendix – Common CLM Functionality.

Specify the Line Type using the Type LOV. Lines are usually Quantity Based (for items/supplies) or Amount Based (for services). Depending on the Line Type that is selected, the Item/Job field is enabled (for Quantity Based types) or disabled (for Amount Based types). If the item or service exists in Inventory, iProcurement store or catalog, then the Description and Category field values are defaulted.

Select from the available Contract Types in the Contract Type LOV. Based on the Contract Type selected, a pricing calculation will take place and the item/service will be priced on the line for quantity based lines. Enter a Quantity in the Qty field and a Unit of Measure in the Unit field. The Amount field gets calculated based on the formula of the Contract Type field, Unit Price, the Quantity and Unit of Measure.

To price amount based lines, select the appropriate line type using the Type LOV. Enter the values of the relevant pricing attributes in the Pricing Details popup and the total amount is computed and stored for that line.

For more details on the various Contract Types and their formulas, please refer to the Appendix - Common CLM Functionality.

Enter a Cost Constraint while updating the line, if required. The default value of the Cost Constraint field is Null.

IDC Types are entered only if the CLM document is an IDV. For an award, the IDC type is not visible.

When the award is approved, the contract type and cost constraint along with the related pricing elements / attributes cannot be updated in any way. If any of these fields need to be changed, a modification document needs to be created. For more information on Modifications, please refer to the Modifications chapter in this guide.

You can choose to create an option line on a purchasing document that you intend to exercise at a future point in time. Instead of modifying the source document at a future date, you can enter the anticipated options on the original award.

For more information on Options, please refer to the Appendix – Common CLM Functionality.

You can also perform actions such as Update, Duplicate and Delete for each line. The Delete Action deletes a line from the award. If you are deleting a CLIN that has SLINs associated to it, the entire CLIN/SLIN structure is deleted. If you delete a SLIN only, the SLINs below it move up one level in the structure for that CLIN/SLIN hierarchy. The Duplicate action makes a copy of the line and places it below the original line. The Update action enables you to view the Update Line page and enter/edit additional line information.

The first region in the Update Lines page defaults the information for the line. In addition, the pricing details are displayed, such as Contract Type, Cost Constraint, Qty, Unit, Unit Price, Total Amount. The formula for calculating the Total Amount is also displayed in this region.

Additional Item Information region

The fields in this region allow you to provide specific details about the item to be ordered. The fields described below are free-text fields are not validated in the system.

Inspection Information region

Federal Customer Designation region

The fields in this region provide information that will allow the order to designate a particular classification code, project and/or program to the item being procured.

Other regions that contain line level fields are: Shipping, Source Document, Contract and Attachments. The Attachment function for lines works in the same way as it does for headers. Please refer to Attachments section in this chapter.

Organize Lines

Click Move on the Lines page in order to modify the CLIN/SLIN structure of your CLM document. The Organize Lines page displays.

The Organize Lines page consists of 2 regions: Current Structure (source) and Target Structure (destination). Select one or more lines by clicking on the Select checkbox in the Current Structure region. Then select the type of move you wish to perform using the Select Action LOV in the Target Structure region. Select from one of the 3 possible values: Move After Selected Line (moves the line after the line you selected in the Edit Lines page), Move Before Selected Line (moves the line above the line you selected in the Edit Lines page) and Move as sub-line(s) under selected line (moves a line as a SLIN under a CLIN). Click Done to save and apply your changes and return to the Lines page. The Lines page displays, showing you the new structure of the lines.

Schedules

The Schedules tab contains information about award shipment schedules. You must have one row for each schedule you attach to a document line. Each row contains the location, quantity, and dates for each shipment schedule. Oracle CLM Purchasing uses this information to record delivery schedule information for awards.

Use the Schedules tab to specify inventory organizations, ship-to locations and the date you want your supplier to deliver the items on the purchase order line. An award line with a quantity of six items can, for example, have two scheduled shipments on separate dates.

Click the Schedules tab to search for your shipment details. You can search by Supplier, Buyer, Item or Location. You can add additional search criteria to your search by using the Add Another LOV and selecting the fields from there. Click Go after you have selected an additional search criteria. Some of the additional search criteria you can user are: Order Date, Effective Date, Description, Document Style, FSC/PSC, MDAPS/MAIS, NAICS, Operating Unit, etc.

Enter schedule details: Schedule, Locations, Organization (Org), Quantity (Qty), Need-By Date, Period of Performance Start Date and Period of Performance End Date. For service lines, period of performance dates is the time period (start and end date) in which the service will take place. A line may not have both a Need-By Date and a Period of Performance Start Date / Period of Performance End Date.

To expand the schedule to full page view, click the Actions Update icon.

The Schedules page enables you to enter the following information:

Shipping region

Distributions

Use the Distributions tab to enter distribution information for purchase order shipments or to view distributions that Oracle CLM Purchasing has automatically created for you. You can enter multiple distributions per shipment line. Additionally, enter funding information for the line in the Distributions tab.

Click the Distributions tab to search for a distribution using one of the following search criteria: Supplier, Buyer, Item, Deliver-To Location. You can search by using additional search criteria - select values from the Add Another LOV and click Go.

The Distributions tab incorporates the following funding fields: Non-DoD Funding Indicator, External Account and FMS Case Number. The External Account and the PO Charge Acct fields are mutually exclusive, that is, either one can be displayed on a single accounting line at a time. The user can select to enter the External Account or the PO Charge Acct through the Type selection. Therefore, when the External is selected it displays in place of the PO Charge Acct.

External Account: This field records the line of accounting that represents the funds from another system. Users can enter free text in this field, multiple values are also acceptable, and it can be printed and integrated to an external system.

Non DoD Funding Indicator: This indicator determines if the LOA is provided from the DoD or not. For DoD orders, this information is important for FPDS-NG reporting.

FMS Case Number: Foreign Military Sales (FMS) case number, which is assigned for DoD purchases for FMS. It is used for FPDS-NG reporting and other roll up reporting so the amount of money spent can be tracked.

Agency Accounting Identifier: This field is used to identify the accounting system to which funds belong.

Funding an Award Line

Users can enter a funded value in the Distributions tab. The funded value is defaulted to the shipment amount in the CLM document. However this can be modified by users and the funded value may be 0 or less than the shipment amount. The Partial Funded checkbox is selected to indicate that the funded value is less than the shipment amount. The following funding-related fields are in the Distributions tab to capture the funding information:

Partial Funded Flag – indicates if a shipment is partially funded or not. If the Partial Funded checkbox is selected, the Funded Value field is enabled. If the Partial Funded checkbox is not selected, the Funded Value field is not enabled. By default, this checkbox is unselected and the Funded Value gets defaulted with shipment amount. However, users can fully fund the document even when the Partial Funded flag is checked. If the Partial Funded flag is not selected, and the Funded Value is less than the shipment amount, an error message displays.

Funded Value – enter and save the Funded Value for each distribution in functional currency. If the Partial Funded checkbox is selected, the Funded Value field is enabled. The Funded Value cannot be greater than the shipment amount for a distribution. The Funded Value cannot be negative. In case you do enter a Funded Value that is greater than the shipment amount or a negative amount, an error message displays.

Quantity Funded – Quantity funded for each distribution and displayed only for Quantity Based lines. The Quantity Funded field is non updateable by the user and is calculated by the system based on the Funded Value. The value of the Quantity Ordered is defaulted to the Quantity Funded field. Quantity Funded gets overwritten if users modify the Funded Value.

Amount Funded – Amount funded in document currency for Amount Based lines only. The Amount Funded field is not updateable by users and is calculated by the system based on the Funded Value. The value of the Amount Ordered field is defaulted to the Amount Funded field. Amount Funded gets overwritten if users modify the Funded Value.

The Functional Currency code is displayed along with the Funded Value label. The sum of the Funded Value fields of the distributions is displayed at the award line level. Similarly the sum of the Funded Value fields is displayed at the header level.

Funds are not reserved or liquidated at the time of CLM document creation. Every CLM document needs to be reserved just before approval. It is only during approval that funds are reserved. When the encumbrance action is successful, the CLM document gets approved. Liquidation/Reservation of the funds takes place when approving an award or modification.

When the Partial Funded checkbox is selected, the Encumbrance is created for the amount equal to the funded value while approving the Award or Modification. Funds are encumbered in a period as per the GL Date entered while creating the CLM document.

When the document is approved, the Encumbered Amount on the distribution should be updated with the Funded Value and encumbered flag is set to Yes. However Distributions that are marked with Prevent Encumbrance flag with a value of Yes are not considered for Encumbrance actions.

Update FPDS-NG Reporting Information action

Your CLM document (Award, IDV or Modification) has an action called Update FPDS-NG Reporting Information in the Actions LOV (the Actions LOV is available on all the tabs). For example, the tabs in an award are: Header, Addresses and Supplier Details, Lines, Schedules and Distributions. Using the Actions LOV on any of these tabs, you can select the action Update FPDS-NG Reporting Information to open the Edit FPDS-NG Reporting Information page. This page enables you to enter/update/view the FPDS-NG reporting details for the CLM document. That is, all the information relevant to FPDS-NG reporting is displayed in this page.

You can also select the action Update FPDS-NG Reporting Information using the Views region in any summary page for any CLM document. Select one CLM document using the Select radiobutton and then choose the action Update FPDS-NG Reporting Information from the Select Award (or Select IDV or Select Modification) LOV.

Please refer to the chapter Federal Procurement Data System – Next Generation (FPDS-NG) for more information.

Warrants for Awards

A Contracting Officer is an official with the authority to obligate money for the federal government. The Contracting Officer’s duties include issuing solicitations, awards, modifications, and orders, and he/she utilizes the majority of the processes and features within the federal system as well.

A Contracting Officer is also assigned the task of approving and signing awards, IDVs and modifications that are within the warrant amount associated with the Contracting Officer. For example, the Contracting Officer has a Type 1 warrant of $5000, and the Type 1 warrant is associated with an award. This means that the total amount (total amount including options) of the award should be $5000 or less, if it needs to be approved by the supplier and the Contracting Officer. If the total amount of the award exceeds $5000, the buyer can assign another Contracting Officer who has the authority to approve and sign for a larger sum of money.

In CLM, a buyer is specified as a Contracting Officer. When a buyer is marked as a Contracting Officer in the system, a warrant is also associated with the Contracting Officer. For more details on setting up warrants, Contracting Officer, associating CLM documents with warrants, etc, please refer to the Contract Lifecycle Management for Public Sector Implementation Guide.

A Warrant consists of Warrant Types and a Contracting Officer association. A Contracting Officer can be associated with one Warrant only. Every Warrant Type has a Warrant Amount associated with it. The Warrant Types are available as lookup values and are seeded in CLM as:

The Warrant Types (can be defined and set up by individual agencies, according to their particular requirements. Additionally, implementers can enter different Warrant Amounts for each Warrant Type, and again, this differs from agency to agency. Warrant Amounts cannot be negative values.

If you wish to ensure that the award amount you submitted for approval is validated against the Warrant Amount, your system administrator needs to enforce warrants by associating a Warrant Type to a CLM document style in the Document Styles page. For example, your Document Style is Delivery Order, and the Warrant Type associated with it is Type 1; Type 1 has a Warrant Amount of $5000 and is associated with a Contracting Officer. Thus, you create a Delivery Order with a total amount of $6000, and the Delivery Order has a Contracting Officer’s name defaulted on it. The Contracting Officer is associated with a Warrant Amount of $5000 for this document style (that is, Delivery Orders). Therefore, the system validates if the Delivery Order total amount exceeds the Warrant Amount that is associated to the Contracting Officer. In our example, the Delivery Order total amount ($6000) exceeds that of the Warrant Amount, and an error message is displayed. You cannot proceed further unless you change the total amount of the Delivery Order or the Contracting Officer, so that another Contracting Officer who has greater authority for obligating larger sums of money can be associated with the Delivery Order.

Enforcing Warrants for an Award

  1. Navigate to the Awards page using the appropriate Purchasing responsibility.

  2. Use the Create LOV to select a Document Style and thereby create a CLM Award. Note that if a warrant is enforced for your selected document style, the award total amount will be validated against the warrant amount.

  3. Use the Header tab to specify a Contracting Officer, if one is not already defaulted.

  4. Enter the relevant information in the Lines, Addresses and Supplier Details, Schedules and Distributions tabs.

  5. Save your work, and then submit your document for approval.

  6. If the warrant currency is different from the ledger currency or the document currency, appropriate validations are carried out and you see an error message.

  7. During document submission, some validations are performed: checks such as the validity of the warrant and Contracting Officer, active status of the warrant, total amount of the award and the total warrant amount, etc are carried out. If any of the validation checks fails, an error message is displayed and you need to make the necessary corrections in order to proceed.

  8. The status of your award is now Pre-Approved or Approved, depending on whether you need the document to be electronically signed by the Contracting Officer. The Acknowledgement column displays whether a signature is required. For more information on electronic signatures, please refer to the Electronic Signatures section.

Approving an Award

When you complete your award and are ready to initiate the approval process, select the Submit button in the update page using any of the sub-tabs (Header, Lines, Schedules, Distributions). The Approvals Workflow along with the Approvals Management Engine (AME) is used to perform the approval cycle. When you select the Submit button, Purchasing performs submission checks to verify that the document is complete and in an appropriate state for the action you chose. Status checks are performed when you take an approval action.

The following fields must be validated and/or populated during the approval process:

Users can approve documents through the Notification Details Web page, accessible through the Notifications Summary menu in Purchasing. The Notifications Summary page lists all the documents awaiting your approval, so that you can manage your pending approval queue and take approval actions. After opening a notification, you can drill down to the document itself, and review it and its action history.

Note: You can modify the document only if Approver Can Modify is enabled for the document type.

Purchasing performs a submission check on all documents that successfully complete a status check whenever you perform or attempt an approval action. The submission check verifies that all mandatory fields have been entered and that various quantities, amounts, and dates are within prescribed ranges or limits. If your document fails any of the submission check rules, Purchasing automatically brings you to the Approval Errors window where you can review the cause(s) of failure. You can then return to the document entry window to make required corrections.

Purchasing offers the following document approval actions in the notification: Approve, Approve and Forward, Forward, and Reject. You can also reassign a notification to somebody else.

Prior to finally approving an award, the system checks to see if the award’s Bilateral Indicator field indicates whether the award approval should be done by the buyer and the supplier. If the Bilateral Indicator field indicates that the supplier’s signature is required, the Vendor Signatory field (Name, Title and Date Signed) are required to be entered. Thus the contracting officer may send the award to the supplier and after receiving the supplier’s signature on the printed award, he may update the award header with the Vendor Signatory information.

Electronic Signature for an Award

If the value of the profile option Contracting Officer’s Electronic Signature Required is set to Yes, then the Contracting Officer will be required to sign an award, IDV or modification document. The value of the Bilateral Indicator LOV can be one of the following:

Bilateral Indicator value Signed by
None Contracting Officer
Proxy Signature Buyer (on behalf of the supplier) and Contracting Officer
Signature Supplier and Contracting Officer

Use the Header tab to specify a Contracting Officer if one is not already defaulted from the Preferences page.

The Purchasing CLM Defaults page in the Preferences link enables you to view the default Contracting Officer. You can override the default values of the Preferences page by entering or selecting the value you want in the CLM document.

Electronically Signing Awards by Supplier and Contracting Officer

When you create an award and wish to obtain supplier acceptance for the award, you need to ensure that the value of the Bilateral Indicator field (in the header tab) is set to Signature and the number of Signed Copies is greater than zero. This enables electronic signature of the CLM document by the supplier and the Contracting Officer. After you submit the document for approval, the status of the document displays as Pre-Approved and the Acknowledgement column displays Pending Supplier Signature.

The following steps need to be performed in order to complete the electronic signature process:

  1. The supplier will sign the document electronically via iSupplier Portal. After the supplier signs the document, you (the Contracting Officer) need to navigate to the Notifications Summary page.

  2. Open the notification that requests your signature. The Notification page requires you to Accept or Reject the document. Enter an acceptance or rejection reason in the Response region and then click Accept if you wish to accept the document, otherwise click Reject or Reassign (to reassign to another Contracting Officer).

  3. On accepting, the Notifications page prompts you for your user name and password to complete the electronic signature process.

If you have logged in as a buyer, using the Awards > Views page, you will see that the status of the award is now Approved and that the value of the Acknowledgement column is now Accepted. Click the Accepted link to view the Acknowledgement History page. Click the eSignature icon in the Acknowledgement History page to view the history of the signature process for this document. The E-record page displays, enabling you to view the signature details, acknowledgement details and other information related to the e-record.

Proxy Signing of Awards by Buyer (on behalf of Supplier) and Contracting Officer

When you create a CLM document and wish to get the document proxy signed, you need to ensure that the value of the Bilateral Indicator field is set to Proxy Signature and the Number of Signed Copies field should have a value greater than zero. This enables electronic signature of the CLM document by the Contracting Officer and proxy signature on behalf of the supplier by the buyer. After you have entered the data in the document and submitted it for approval, the status of the document displays In Process and the Acknowledgement column should display Requires Signature. After the approvers have approved the document, the status of the document should be Pre-Approved and the Acknowledgement column should display Requires Signature.

As a buyer, you need to perform the following steps to complete the proxy signature process:

  1. The buyer opens the notification and signs on behalf of the supplier. The notification requesting your (buyer's) signature displays in the Open Notifications view in the Notifications Summary. The sender of this notification is the supplier user, on whose behalf the you will be signing.

  2. Enter relevant values in the Response region (for the following fields: Comments, Supplier Contact Name, Supplier Title, Signed Date).

  3. On accepting (you can reject or reassign as well), you need to enter your user name and password in order to complete the proxy signature process.

  4. The status of the CLM document is still Pre-Approved, and the value of the Acknowledgement column is Pending Contracting Officer Signature.

As the Contracting Officer, you need to perform the following steps to complete the Proxy Signature process:

  1. Login as the Contracting Officer and use the appropriate Purchasing responsibility. Navigate to the Notifications Summary page.

  2. The Notifications Summary page shows you the notification requesting your signature. Click on the notification link or select the checkbox next to the notification link and then click Open.

  3. The Notification Details page displays the supplier and buyer names. Additionally, you can enter a reason for accepting or rejecting the CLM document. You can perform the following actions with respect to the document: Accept, Reject, Forward, Reassign.

  4. If you click Accept, the Sign Notification page displays, where you (as the Contracting Officer) need to enter your user name and password in order to complete the electronic signature process. Enter your user name and password in the fields indicated, and then click Sign.

  5. The status of your CLM document should be Approved and the Acknowledgement column should display the value Accepted.

  6. Click the Accepted link in the Acknowledgement column to display the Acknowledgement History page. Click each or any of the e-Signature icons in the Acknowledgment History page to open the Electronic Records and Signatures: E-record details page. This page displays the signature, acknowledgement and other details pertaining to the signature action.

Update Approved Award without a Modification

When your award has been approved, and you wish to update some information on it without going through the modification process, select the Update without Modification action in the View region of the Awards page. This action is available only for the views that display approved awards.

The Update page opens, showing you 2 regions that you can update: Addresses region and Attachments region.

The Addresses region shows you the COTR Office and Contact details that you can update for an approved award.

The Attachments region displays the existing attachments to the award and enables you to add other attachments, if required. In the Add Attachment page, the Attachment Summary Information region enables you to select a Category. Note that you can only select the Internal to Purchase Order category.

When you save and apply your work, you return to the Awards page with the Views region displaying your approved awards.

Closeout of Awards

You can closeout contracts in a different process from that of annual closes or financial closes where closed funds are never reopened for follow-on actions.

Contracts are closed and retained in different timeframes, depending on agency to agency. The average retention period is at least six years. The contract closeout process is more complicated when contracts have been administered by separate ACO (administrative contract office) and PCO (procuring contract office) offices, since each office has a different set of modifications that must be reconciled. Complicating the process even more is the fact that contract closeout can occur prior to the funds being formally closed since fiscal close is an independent process.

Navigate to the Awards page use the Views region to view approved awards, because only approved awards can be closed out. Select the Closeout action from the Actions LOV and click Go. The Closeout page displays. The Closeout Indicator LOV has 4 values:

Select a value from the Closeout Indicator and click Apply. The closeout process may take place in any of the following ways:

If you have an draft modification associated with the award, the system displays an error message. You need to cancel or approve the modification before proceeding with closeout.

The Awards page is displayed again and your award status now shows the Closeout Indicator value. For example, if you have selected Physically Complete from the Closeout Indicator, the award status displays Physically Complete. Click on the Status hyperlink to view the action history of the closeout in the Action History page. It will show the closeout and reopen actions only, not the intermediary stages of closeout.

If you have finally closed out your award, you can reopen it if required. The award can be closed out and reopened any number of times. The Actions LOV in the View region of the Award page enables you to reopen the closed out award. The status of the award changes to Approved again, however you can see that the award was reopened when you click the Status hyperlink and view the Action History page.

The Action History page displays when you click the Status hyperlink of the approved award. The Action History page shows you the sequence number of the action you took with respect to the closed out award. In addition, this page also displays the person who performed the action on the award, the date the action was performed, etc. The Notes column captures and displays the Reason you provided while closing out or re-opening an award.

Complex Work Orders

Complex work orders have high dollar values, often running into several millions of dollars. They are also long lead time contracts, sometimes extending over multiple years. They may be outsourced high-value projects that require extensive collaboration between the buying and supplying organizations. These contracts are characterized by progress payments that are governed by the advanced payment terms, and which are released based on completion of work. Additionally, complex work contracts can also have provisions for Contract Financing.

Some terms that are used when creating and using complex work orders:

The procurement of the complex services often starts off from a service request that can originate from one of several sources – Project Managers in charge of a construction project, engineers in the field, or even architects. These service requests are often high dollar value and involve services that require longer lead times to be fulfilled. Due to this buying organizations can determine that fulfilling the request will need sourcing and negotiation activity and ultimately a contract with complex payment terms.

Sourcing professionals then create a sourcing event and invite bids from multiple suppliers. Since these contracts can be complex, the entire sourcing process may involve multiple rounds of negotiation on various aspects of the contract such as payment terms, whether there would be provisions for contract financing, advances, how high the recoupment rate and the retainage rate will be, etc. Another key aspect that is negotiated on is the Progress Payment Schedule, its structure and how the work will be performed, the payment associated with each pay item, and the provisions for Contract Financing and Advances.

And finally, the Buyer and the Contractor also negotiate on applicable Clauses, deliverables such as lien wavers, insurance certificates and their due dates.

Once the process of sourcing the complex services is complete, the best party is awarded the contract. The negotiated complex payment terms and the progress payment schedule now become a part of the contract and both parties can sign-off on the same. The contract is now ready for execution.

The contractor now initiates work on the progress schedule of the contract. If there are provisions on the contract for contract financing such advances, they can be billed before work starts.

The contractor now performs work on the progress payment schedule & periodically reports progress and requests payment either in the form of a Work Confirmation or a Payment Request. These documents state the amount of work completed on different components of the progress payment schedule, and usually need to be approved by designated individuals like Engineers, Project Managers or Architects on the clients side before any payment can be released.

After the work progress is approved, the contractor submits an Invoice for payment. Complex Payment Terms specified on the contract are now used to calculate the payment due to the contractor. Previous contract financing payments, if any, can be recouped, and applicable retainage can be withheld before a payment is made to the contractor.

Alternatively, if the contractor’s invoice is for financing payments these can be released and tracked as such on the contract so that they can be recouped subsequently from invoices for services deliveries. Oracle Purchasing owns the contract and tracks the execution of the contract, and maintains a current status of the contract through its lifecycle.

The Contractor can report progress on the Progress Payment Schedule by submitting Work Confirmations through Oracle iSupplier Portal. Alternatively the Buyer can report progress on behalf of the Contractor from within Oracle Purchasing.

Oracle Payables provides capability to process payments for the contract. Advances, and other Contract Financing, Progress Payments, Retainage witholdings and Retainage Release can all be processed using Oracle Payables in conjunction with the terms defined on the Contract.

An example of a complex work order is Renovation of Parking Lot Services.

Enter a complex work order by selecting the appropriate document style for a complex award using the Create LOV. The price for the Parking Lot Renovation Service is $1,000,000.

You can enter a priced line or an informational line on a complex work order. However, please note that the informational lines do not have any pay items associated with them.

Every complex work order line is automatically numbered, however you can change the numbering of a line. The Contract Line (CLIN) and Sub-line (SLIN) structure is used in all CLM purchasing documents, including modifications and amendments to the purchasing documents. A Contract Line captures information about the item(s) or service(s) to be procured in the contract with or without the pricing details. Thus, a Contract Line (CLIN) can be a priced line or an informational line. Similarly, Sub-Lines, which are used to capture additional information about the CLIN, can be priced sub-lines or informational sub-lines.

CLIN numbers are always 4 digit numeric values that fall in the range 0001-9999. Duplicate numbers are not supported by the system and an error message displays if a duplicate number is found. A segment with 4 digit numeric values from 0001 – 9999 is defined for each document. The numbers are sequentially generated.

SLINS are Sub-lines that use a 6-character numbering format – numeric or alphanumeric. The first 4 digits of the SLINs are populated with the parent CLIN number. The next 2 digits are automatically generated, based on whether the SLIN is a Priced sub-line or an Informational sub-line. SLIN numbers cannot be updated by you. If the SLIN is Informational, the last 2 digits are always numeric values in the range 01-99. If the SLIN is Priced, the last 2 digits are always alphabetical values ranging from AA to ZZ (except the alphabets I and O which are not used in number generation at all). For more information on the guidelines that govern the numbering of purchasing document lines, please refer to the Appendix – Key CLM Functionality.

Specify the Line Type using the Type LOV. Lines are usually Quantity Based (for items/supplies) or Amount Based (for services). Depending on the Line Type that is selected, the Item/Job field is enabled (for Quantity Based types) or disabled (for Amount Based types).

Note: Rate based temp labor line type is not available on the CLM complex work order.

If the item or service exists in Inventory, iProcurement store or catalog, then the Description and Category field values are defaulted. Select from the available Contract Types in the Contract Type LOV. Based on the Contract Type selected, a pricing calculation will take place and the item/service will be priced on the line. Enter a Quantity in the Qty field and a Unit of Measure in the Unit field. The Amount field gets calculated based on the formula of the Contract Type field, Unit Price, the Quantity and Unit of Measure.

You can choose to create an option line on a purchasing document that you intend to exercise at a future point in time. Instead of modifying the source document at a future date, you can enter the anticipated options on the original award. Option lines (both exercised and unexercised) can have pay items.

For more information on Options, please refer to the Appendix – Key CLM Functionality.

You can also perform actions such as Update, Duplicate and Delete for each line. The Delete Action deletes a line from the award. The Duplicate action makes a copy of the line and places it below the original line. The Update action enables you to view the Update Line page and enter/edit additional line information.

The first region in the Update Lines page defaults the information for the line. In addition, the pricing details are displayed, such as Contract Type, Cost Constraint, Qty, Unit, Unit Price, Total Amount. The formula for calculating the Total Amount is also displayed in this region. The details page for the line displays with more information such as the complex payment terms etc. The details page enables you to capture several pieces of critical information for the Complex Services Contract.

Buyers can define a scope of work which is really the description of the service that is being procured. This can be captured either as the Line Description or can be attached as an external document. For more information on attaching documents, please refer to the Attachments section in this chapter.

Complex Payment Terms for Financing, and Retainage are captured on the line. In our example for Financing, you can enter the Advance Amount, Recoupment Rate, Maximum Retainage Amount and the Retainage Rate. Please note that the advance amount cannot be more than the funded amount for the line. These terms defined here apply uniformly to the entire progress payment schedule of this line, that is, the Retainage Rate of 10% is applied to all invoices submitted against pay items of this line. Similarly, the Recoupment Rate of 10% is applied to all Invoices submitted against pay items of this line.

Further to this, certain attributes defined at the line behave as defaults onto the progress payment schedule. Billing details like the Charge Account, Accrue at Receipt, Project Information etc all act as defaults for the payment schedule and as each new pay item is created for the line, it assumes these values.

The Progress Payment Schedule page replaces the Schedules tab because the complex work order does not have delivery schedules.

Several additional details can be specified for the pay items on the details page. The Pay Items details page can be accessed using the pencil icon.

There are three types of Pay Items - Rate, Lumpsum, and Milestone.

Rate pay items are based on a Rate of work completion. Payments for these can be claimed as units of work are completed. In our example we have a rate pay item for Landscape designer services for 25 Hrs @ $1000.00/hr.

Lump Sum pay items, as the name suggest, are based on a Lump Sum amount allocated to a portion of work. Progress payments can be released for these pay items based on the level of completion. In our example we have 2 lump sum pay items, one for Resurfacing the entire parking lot for 20,000 dollars, and another for Road work for a total amount of 50,000 dollars.

Milestone pay items are based on a milestone in the contract or event that needs to be fully complete before the associated payment can be claimed by the contractor. In our example, the milestone for claiming the last 50,000 dollars on the contract is to complete the final painting on the parking lot.

The pay item details page has more details that the Buyer can specify for each pay item. Attributes such as Work Location, Receiving Controls, and Billing information can be specified here. Additionally, documents such as drawings, or specifications for the pay item can be uploaded as an attachment.

On the Distributions tab, you can specify specific charge accounts for the advance, or the accounts generator can be configured to generate an account for the Advance automatically. Accounts can also be generated automatically for every pay item on the progress payment schedule. Please note that the advance amount cannot be more than the funded amount for the line.

iSupplier Portal offers several features to the supplier that provide capabilities to track, monitor, and manage the Complex Services Contract. Using the portal, the Supplier can track the progress on each individual pay item of the Progress Payment Schedule, acknowledge and sign the document before it become a formal contract, request for changes to the contract, and create and submit work confirmation to report the progress on the Contract. Please note that you cannot create a work confirmation for the pay item if the line amount is greater than the funded amount. Also for pay items with a funding of 0 (zero), the lines are not available for creating work confirmations.

For more information on iSupplier Portal, please refer to the Oracle Contract Lifecycle Management for Public Sector iSupplier Portal User Guide.