GSA SmartPay 2

The GSA SmartPay® program office began planning for the follow-on charge card program, referred to as GSA SmartPay® 2 or SP2, by initiating extensive outreach efforts to identify where program improvements could be made. These efforts included interviews of government program participants and stakeholders, panel discussions, focus groups, surveys, and extensive industry interaction including a Request for Information (RFI). 

On September 28, 2006, the GSA SmartPay® office released the Request for Proposals (RFP) for the GSA SP2 program on FedBizOpps. The contract, which is effective November 30, 2008, was awarded to Citibank, GE Capital Financial, JP Morgan Chase, U.S. Bank. The SP2 program seeks to provide agencies with improvements in these key areas:

New products and services. New products and services are offered as core requirements, separately priced items, and value added items, including: pre-paid cards, contract less cards, and cards in foreign currencies. The government also asked offerors to propose alternatives to convenience check use;

Enhanced customer service. Worldwide customer service 24/7 has been expanded to include the option for agencies/organizations to receive foreign language customer support for cardholders using their cards overseas, as specified at the task order level;

Security of systems and data. The SP2 solicitation contains increased security requirements regarding data management and handling, including new requirements that successful offerors comply with the Federal Information Security Management Act of 2002 (FISMA) and the Payment Card Industry (PCI) security standards, house their data facilities in the United States, and restrict data access to personnel with the required level of security clearance. In addition, successful offerors will be required to comply with new program data and interface standards;

Interchange rates. Lowered interchange rates for government to government transactions are required, as well as reduced rates or other alternative approaches for "large ticket" purchases;

Enhanced data capture. Innovative solutions were sought from offerors to improve the quality of data (e.g., expanded collection of Level 3 data) to support the government's strategic sourcing initiatives, risk mitigation measures, management reports, and other program reporting objectives;

Tax reclamation. Improvements in tax recovery are required to facilitate recovery of taxes paid by agencies/organizations on tax exempt government transactions; and,

Live test demonstrations. Offerors determined to be within the competitive range were required to submit their Electronic Access System to GSA testing.

The contract period for SP2 includes a transitional period and a transactional period. The transitional period began on the date of award and ends November 29, 2008. The transactional period (when actual transactions began to be processed through systems belonging to/associated with successful offerors) began as early as November 30, 2007, and has a four-year base period, with one four-year option period, and one three-year option period.