Best Practices for Government Purchases

Across the country, state and federal governments are working hard to identify savings through smarter strategies in procuring products and services. The average savings across procurement categories is 14 percent. Because one great idea sparks another, below is a sampling of how this is being accomplished.

• With a focus on working simpler, smarter and faster, the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts has been studying its processes and inviting employee feedback and ideas. An immediate success was a 20 percent savings in the cost of toner cartridges by consolidating the amount requested a year into one contract, saving about $73,000. Another was a $130,000 savings in print and mailing costs by taking a close look at agency publications to reduce, combine or publish online. And more than $450,000 in savings came from prioritizing information technology projects and reducing contracted services.
• What would you do with a castoff medical van? Well, if you're The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, you wouldn't ditch it - you'd refurbish it into a state-of-the-art blood donor mobile van, saving $100,000 off the cost of a new one. Rick Dillard, M. D. Anderson's Asset Management manager, has been extraordinarily successful in recycling and reusing materials and equipment to squeeze the most bang out of every buck.
  
  Every year, the division recycles about 24 tons of scrap metal and 600 wood pallets, slashing the need for costly dumpster retrievals. Asset Management also has recycled about 10,000 old computers and related equipment for use by Texas public schools. And the division conducts monthly online auctions of surplus furniture, vehicles and medical equipment that have raised more than $684,000 since January 2005.
• The Internal Revenue Service is saving $4 million annually thanks to the close look it gave to its 4,000 copy machines. By reducing the number of suppliers from 43 to only 3, savings of 20 percent have been achieved over previous expenditures.
• The state of Iowa's Charter Agencies program requires participating state agencies to agree to be held strictly accountable for measurable service improvements and cost cutting in return for being exempted from many bureaucratic requirements.
• More than 170 state agencies and institutions and nearly 500 local governments use the state of Virginia's Internet-based eVA purchasing system to buy goods in an electronic marketplace featuring more than 25,000 vendors. Virginia credits the system with saving the state and local governments $36.5 million annually and slashing the cost of purchase order processing by about 50 percent.
• The District of Columbia Office of Contracting and Procurement has created a database of exemplary "Statements of Work" —a document describing work needed to complete a project and the resulting deliverables—to be used in drafting contracts for various goods and services.
• The state of Maryland's Department of Business and Economic Development has created a Business Opportunities Guide to assist small companies in seeking contracts with federal facilities within the state. The guide is intended to provide a "roadmap" to the complexities of the federal purchasing process.
• Under its "shared services" model, the state of Illinois recently consolidated all legal services connected with contracting and procurement into a single legal office; consolidated all IT and telecommunications services other than those for public safety, a move expected to improve the state's purchasing power for related procurements; and introduced a standardized procurement process for goods and services across all state agencies.
• The state of Delaware's "Partners in Procurement" program centralized state purchasing and took advantage of techniques such as online reverse auctions, improved purchase tracking and product rebates to slash prices on goods and services the state purchases in large quantities, such as office supplies, food and computer equipment.

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