GSA puts eTravel in express lane

eTravel RFP materials at FedBizOpps.gov

The General Services Administration wants one major federal agency to be using the coming Web-based eTravel system by December. The agency issued the final request for proposals late last month and has instructed vendors to submit proposals by the end of this month.

GSA knows it has set an "aggressive time line," but the agency does not expect to extend it, said C.J. DeBernard, the project's contracting officer. He and other officials spoke March 7 at a pre-proposal conference in Washington, D.C., to answer questions from potential contractors and agencies.

ETravel, one of the five e-government initiatives GSA is in charge of, will be an end-to-end, Web-based travel reservation and fulfillment system, offering agencies a single, seamless system for making reservations and managing payments.

The RFP requires the winning contractor to own, host and manage the system, and agencies will purchase it as a service. The indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract has a potential maximum value of $10 billion and a maximum length of 10 years, including three option periods.

The target dates are coming fast, though. GSA wants to award the contract by June, project manager Tim Burke said. The agency wants to see "initial operating capability," which includes one implementation, an integration platform and a data warehouse structure, by July or August.

The winning contractor should achieve "full operating capability," with a system ready to scale governmentwide, between August and December, he said.

The winning contractor or contractors will have flexibility in building the system, Burke said. "This RFP clearly creates room for creativity and innovation," he said. The project "is going to work only with a little bit of shared risk" by the contractors, he said.

Although the contract will allow vendor flexibility, GSA will urge contractors to adhere to the government's enterprise architecture program, said Karl Ficenc, an e-business specialist in information technology firm CACI Inc.'s Acquisition Solutions Group and a support contractor to GSA.

The system should be able to support 5,000 to 10,000 concurrent users, he added. GSA's intent is to create a system that is truly self-service.

The winning contractor should use commercial software when possible and must provide a range of customer support services. GSA offers no transaction guarantees for the winning vendor, but Burke said in an interview at the conference that four or five large agencies are "ready to go" when the system is available.

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ETravel itinerary

March 28: Proposals due.

July to August: Initial operating capability.

August to December: Full operating capability.

December: At least one large agency using the system.