The FAR Overhaul: Cutting Red Tape or Losing the Point?

August 26, 2025

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The Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) is undergoing the most significant overhaul since it was first issued in 1984. Procurement law expert, Alan Chvotkin, partner at Center Law Group, joins Fed Gov Today with Francis Rose to explain what the changes mean for agencies, contractors, and the future of government buying.

Chvotkin begins with the System for Award Management (SAM) database, the central registry for contractors doing business with the federal government. Managed by GSA with input from the Department of Treasury and other agencies, SAM is a required gateway for every contractor seeking a federal contract. Since 2018, FAR required companies to maintain continuous registration from the time they submitted a proposal until the moment they received an award. While intended to ensure accountability, this rule often backfired. Contractors who let their registration lapse—even for a day—were sometimes deemed ineligible, despite meeting all substantive requirements.

Agencies themselves often wanted to move forward, but the rule tied their hands. Chvotkin explains that some agencies quietly adopted deviations to keep projects on track. Finally, in November 2024, the FAR Council revised the rule: now contractors must be registered at two specific points in time—when they submit an offer and when they are awarded the contract. “We don’t care what happens in between,” Chvotkin says, calling it a win for both government and industry. The rule was finalized last week, making it permanent. His advice, though, is clear: companies should stay continuously registered anyway, because award timing is unpredictable.

Registration, he notes, is not a simple one-click task. SAM requires annual renewal, with certifications on issues ranging from company size to whether firms sell Chinese telecommunications equipment. Recent upgrades have made the system easier to use, but validation by the government still takes time. Contractors must plan ahead to avoid gaps.

Beyond SAM, Chvotkin steps back to assess the larger FAR overhaul. The original vision in 1984 was straightforward: create one rulebook for the government’s acquisition of goods and services. Almost immediately, however, agencies began adopting deviations. Over time, court decisions and new laws layered additional complexity onto the FAR. Today, the regulation can feel unwieldy, deterring many new companies from entering the federal marketplace.

That is why Chvotkin welcomes the current effort, ordered by the President in April, to modernize and streamline the FAR. The Council, led by GSA, OFPP, DOD, and NASA, has already revised 22 of the FAR’s 50 parts, aiming to finish by October. Chvotkin applauds the elimination of outdated provisions but warns that some useful guidance has been lost. For example, FAR Part 10, on market research, has been pared down, stripping out references to outreach with small businesses and techniques for evaluating industry capabilities. Similarly, changes to FAR Part 12 on commercial items may reduce clarity for buyers.

For Chvotkin, the main challenge is balance. He supports efforts to simplify, but he argues the FAR Council must also guard against unnecessary agency deviations and preserve tools that help government buyers understand the marketplace. The goal from 1984—one clear, uniform rulebook—remains valid. “We lost that bubble early on,” he says, “and I’d like to recapture that.”

You can read Alan's blog post here