Responsibilities
FAR 15.303 establishes clear roles and responsibilities for agency heads, source selection authorities, and contracting officers to ensure a fair, consistent, and best-value source selection process.
Overview
FAR 15.303 outlines the key responsibilities in the source selection process for competitive acquisitions. It assigns the overall responsibility for source selection to agency heads, but typically delegates the role of source selection authority (SSA) to the contracting officer unless another individual is appointed. The SSA is tasked with forming a qualified evaluation team, approving the source selection strategy or acquisition plan, ensuring consistency in solicitation documents, evaluating proposals strictly according to stated criteria, considering advisory recommendations, and ultimately selecting the proposal(s) that offer the best value to the government. The contracting officer acts as the main point of contact for offerors after solicitation release, manages communications with offerors post-proposal receipt, and is responsible for awarding the contract(s). This section ensures a structured, fair, and transparent source selection process.