How to read an award record

Where the record comes from

Every contract action is reported by the contracting office to FPDS and republished on USASpending. The field names below follow those two systems. LastAwarded labels them in plain words but keeps the meaning.

The identity fields

PIID. The Procurement Instrument Identifier is the contract or order number. For most DoD awards the first six characters identify the contracting office, the next two are the fiscal year, the ninth letter is the instrument type, and the rest is a serial number. Common letters: C for a contract, D for an indefinite delivery contract, P for a purchase order, F for an order under an existing vehicle, A for a blanket purchase agreement. An order also carries the PIID of its parent vehicle, so you can trace it back.

Action type. Whether this line is a new award or a modification, and if a modification, why: exercise an option, add funding, change quantity, terminate. A contract's history is a chain of these lines. The first tells you about the competition; the later ones tell you about the money and the dates.

Vendor. The legal name, UEI, and CAGE code as registered at the time. Names vary across actions for the same shop; see why vendor names lie.

The money fields

Obligated amount. Dollars committed on this action. It can be small, zero, or negative on a modification. Add up the actions to get the total obligated to date.

Base and exercised options value. The current agreed value given the options used so far. USASpending calls this the current award amount.

Base and all options value. The total if every option is exercised. USASpending calls it the potential award amount. This is the ceiling, and on an IDIQ it is often far above what is ever ordered. Never read it as a price.

The date fields

Period of performance. A start date, a current end date, and a potential end date. The current end date moves each time an option is exercised. The potential end date is the outer limit and the anchor for recompete timing.

Action date. When this line was signed. The gap between the action date and the date it appears in the feed is the reporting lag.

The competition fields

Set-aside. Whether the buy was reserved for small business or for a specific program such as 8(a), HUBZone, SDVOSB, or WOSB, or open to all. Blank or "none" means no set-aside.

Extent competed. Full and open competition, full and open after exclusion of sources, not competed, not available for competition, or follow-on to a competed action. Orders under a vehicle carry their own flag for whether fair opportunity was given.

Number of offers received. The count of offers or quotes the buyer got. A single offer on a competitive buy is the most useful fact on the record: the buyer wanted competition and did not get it.

Reason not competed. When present, it says why: only one responsible source, urgency, authorized by statute, and so on. "Only one source" on a part usually means restricted sources and a source approval process ahead of you.

The what and where fields

PSC. The product or service code. For parts it is a four-character federal supply class, such as the class for airframe structural components or the class for commercial hardware. For repair it starts with the letter J. PSC is usually a better description of the item than NAICS.

NAICS. The industry code the buyer assigned, which set the size standard for small business status on this buy. It tells you how the buyer thinks about the work, not always what the item is.

Description. A short free-text field. For DLA buys it often holds the stock number and nomenclature. For others it can be a program name or nothing useful.

Place of performance. Where the work is done or the item is delivered. For supply contracts it is often the vendor's own address, which makes it a useful way to find local competitors. For services it is usually the government site.