USFCR Blog

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Government contract performance does not pause for the holidays unless the contract says it does. Delivery dates and periods of performance run on the contract's terms, while the government's own eleven federal holidays close offices, slow approvals, and stretch response times. This year adds a second variable: federal funding is only secured through December 11, 2026, a date that falls inside the same stretch. The contract still decides what's owed, but funding status now decides whether the office answering the phone is open at all.

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A government contract is the government buying something it needs from your business. A government grant funds a public purpose the government wants carried out. For most small businesses selling a product or service, the contract side applies. Confirm which instrument a specific opportunity uses before you spend time on it, because the choice controls your registrations and your recourse after a loss.

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Federal contracting enters 2027 less settled than it looked mid-year. DoD suspended CMMC Phase 2 in July 2026, so third-party certification isn't becoming a November 2026 award condition after all, though the underlying cybersecurity rules stay in force. A separate NDAA requirement pushes DoD to expand how it credits commercial past performance by December 18, 2026. Meanwhile, procurement forecasts keep consolidating and firm-fixed-price contracts are now the government's stated default.

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Defining 2027 success means writing down, in numbers, what winning looks like for your business before the year starts: the federal revenue you are building toward, the pipeline that supports it, the capabilities you will add, and the relationships you will develop. A goal you can measure changes decisions all year, and this workshop walks through setting each one in a single working session.

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This year, the USFCR blog covered the full landscape of federal contracting, from the FAR overhaul, CMMC implementation, and the CPARS changes to fiscal-year strategy, disaster readiness, and the commercial-to-government transition. The same expertise behind that public content drives USFCR's direct work with contractors. For readers who used the blog to navigate 2026, direct engagement applies the same depth to your specific business, your market, and the year ahead.

Federal contracting compliance means delivering what your contract says and following every rule its clauses pull in, from how you bill to what you owe your subcontractors. Most small contractors who get in trouble don't break a big rule. They let a registration lapse, skip a clause, or lose the records that prove the work was done.

Picture a contracting officer emailing to ask for records from a job you finished eight months ago. Could you send them by Friday?

For a lot of small businesses, the honest answer is "probably, if I can find them." Most compliance trouble starts right there. A file that never got saved. A clause nobody read. A registration that drifted out of date while everyone was busy doing the actual work.

Whether you're chasing your first award or already delivering on one, the habits below are worth building now, before anyone asks.

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A year-end compliance checklist for federal contractors covers two lists this year: the standing items that renew every year, led by SAM registration and certification maintenance, and the items that changed for 2027, including a new performance-record model on DoD contracts, documentation obligations that now follow a contract through its whole lifecycle, and a CMMC certification requirement currently on hold pending a DoD review. Working both lists in December protects eligibility before January pursuits begin.

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Sources sought notices and requests for information (RFIs) are market research tools agencies use before writing a solicitation, not the solicitation itself. Responding matters because it gives the contracting officer documented evidence to set the work aside for small businesses and to avoid writing requirements only one company can meet. Skip these notices, and you're showing up after the requirement and the set-aside decision are already locked in.

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Hurricane Isaias made landfall near Destin, Florida, on October 9, 2026, as a Category 2 storm, and recovery is still in the emergency stage. Federal emergency declarations for parts of Florida, Alabama, and Georgia currently fund only emergency protective measures. That means most contractor work right now runs through counties, cities, and established prime contractors. An active SAM registration with a Disaster Response Registry listing is the first step toward getting involved.

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In commercial business, overhead is a private number folded into your price, and customers judge only the price. In government contracting, overhead becomes a structured, visible rate: indirect costs are grouped into defined pools, applied through calculated rates, and, on cost-type work, billed provisionally and settled against actuals. The difference shapes how you price, what your accounting system must do, and how buyers judge whether your numbers are realistic.