EPA OIG: Weak Management of a Climate Change Services Contract Creates Risk EPA Did Not Receive Services for Which It Paid

The EPA lacks a process to verify that contractor personnel had the skill level to satisfy contract requirements. We reviewed all 93 task orders for contract EP-W-07-067 and focused on task order 25. The task order 25 review revealed several problems:

•   The task order did not list any employees named in reviewed invoices.
•   The EPA repeatedly modified the task order to increase funding from an initial estimate of $310,917 to over $2,000,000.
•   The contracting officer’s representative for task order 25 accepted the contractor’s deliverables without documenting a review of the contractor’s personnel qualifications in comparison with the labor categories invoiced.
•   The task order was closed without all deliverables being met.

There was almost no contract management after the contract was awarded, and the contracting officer had little involvement with contract administration and delegated most tasks to the contracting officer’s representatives.