Contractors usually assume that authorities auditors have particular authority to interpret the Value Accounting Requirements. That assumption is straightforward to know — auditors incessantly take the place that there’s only one “proper” approach for a corporation to do its contract price accounting, based mostly on how different corporations do issues. However contractors ought to know that CAS is versatile and usually provides them choices about comply, based mostly on the circumstances of their enterprise. In brief, a contractor’s enterprise judgment issues, and contractors can use it to push again on auditors who take an excessively inflexible view of CAS.

Authorities procurement officers and auditors don’t have any particular authority to say what CAS means, i.e., their interpretations of CAS obtain no deference in a dispute. See Perry v. Martin Marietta Corp., 47 F.3d 1134, 1137 (Fed. Cir. 1995); Raytheon Co., Area & Airborne Sys., ASBCA No. 57801, 15-1 BCA ¶ 36024. Amongst different causes, CAS was promulgated by the Value Accounting Requirements Board, a singular federal entity created by statute, and never by federal procurement officers or auditors.

By design, the plain language of CAS usually provides the contractor discretion to select from a spread of choices for structuring its price accounting practices. There are 19 requirements underneath CAS, and every has built-in flexibility to permit contractors to decide on price accounting practices that align with the sensible realities of their enterprise. No two companies are precisely alike, and the requirements acknowledge that totally different corporations will select totally different approaches. Auditors usually overlook this side of CAS, they usually could take a slender view of what it means to conform. However contractors ought to all the time ask: Does the related CAS give me any selections, and if that’s the case, is the auditor considering too rigidly concerning the requirements?

Think about CAS 410, which supplies guidelines for allocating the overall & administrative bills of operating a enterprise (“G&A”). CAS 410 requires a contractor to allocate G&A to a base that “greatest represents the full exercise” of the enterprise, and it units out three choices for attaining that purpose: (1) a complete price enter base, utilizing all the prices of the enterprise unit; (2) a value-added base, which excludes materials and subcontract prices; and (3) a single component base, by which the contractor selects an equitable component for allocation, akin to direct labor hours or {dollars}. See CAS 410-50(d).

CAS 410 makes clear that there is no such thing as a “proper” technique, and that the reply relies on the details of the enterprise. It states that “[t]he willpower of which price enter base greatest represents the full exercise of a enterprise unit should be judged on the idea of the circumstances of every enterprise unit.” Id. The Armed Companies Board of Contract Appeals (“ASBCA”) has confirmed that the “judgment” at difficulty is the contractor’s, not the federal government’s.

In a foundational resolution on CAS 410, the ASBCA held that “[i]n our view, an evaluation of which allocation base most precisely distributes G&A expense in relation to advantages obtained could, in line with CAS 410, contain the appliance by the contractor of cheap judgment.” Ford Aerospace and Commc’ns Corp., ASBCA No. 23833, 83-2 BCA ¶ 16813 (emphasis added).

Equally, think about CAS 402, which supplies that “[n]o ultimate price goal shall have allotted to it as an oblique price any price, if different prices incurred for a similar function, in like circumstances, have been included as a direct price of that or another ultimate price goal.” CAS 402-40. Whereas that normal could seem prescriptive, CAS 402-50(b) makes clear that the contractor has a large measure of discretion to find out what prices are correctly handled as “oblique,” as long as the contractor’s Disclosure Assertion explains its practices and the contractor persistently applies the usual. See CAS 402-50(b). The U.S. Courtroom of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has commented that “CAS 402 provides the contractor appreciable freedom within the classification of explicit prices[.]” ATK Thiokol, Inc. v. United States, 598 F.3d 1329, 1332 (Fed. Cir. 2010).

Nearly the entire CAS requirements embody comparable flexibility. E.g., CAS 403-60 (offering a listing of “illustrative allocation bases” for residence workplace prices, “which may very well be utilized in applicable circumstances”); CAS 406-20 (offering standards for “choice” of a price accounting interval); CAS 418-20 (offering “steerage regarding the number of allocation measures based mostly on the useful or causal relationship between an oblique price pool and price aims”).

So how can the flexibleness of CAS assist a contractor to navigate an audit or dispute? When confronted with an auditor who views CAS as a matter of “proper/fallacious” or “sure/no,” a contractor ought to fastidiously evaluate the CAS precept at difficulty to see if it supplies the corporate any discretion. The contractor must also think about the CAS Board’s regulatory historical past for the usual, and may additionally wish to evaluate case regulation from the Boards of Contract Appeals and Federal Courts. The contractor ought to then search for methods to clarify its selections to the auditor, together with by sharing the explanations it chosen a selected method and the way different approaches may very well be overly burdensome or might negatively influence the pursuits of the enterprise or the federal government.

For instance, is it impractical to deal with sure components/supplies as a direct price, contemplating how they’re saved and used on the store ground? Would a complete price enter base fail to replicate the true relationship of G&A exercise with the corporate’s enterprise, contemplating how administration spends its time and assets? Would the auditor’s G&A method result in unstable swings in price allocation from yr to yr? Relying on the solutions, these sensible factors can again up a contractor’s selections and assist justify them underneath CAS. A contractor may additionally wish to display that its accounting practices are described in its inside insurance policies and (if relevant) in its CAS Disclosure Assertion. Advance written descriptions of accounting insurance policies may also go a great distance towards serving to help an organization’s observe.