Do you know that the Department of Defense (DoD) and the federal government has a new contract procurement and administration system? Yes, and it is called “Procurement Integrated Enterprise Environment,” (the PIEE, for short).
From the 18th of August, 2018, the PIEE replaces the WAWF (Wide Area Work Flow) as well as the Electronic Data Access (ECA) to become the new standard for all DoD’s acquisition processes. So to understand the new PIEE, we need to revisit WAWF and what it stood for.
What does WAWF Means?
WAWF is the acronym for Work Area Work Flow. It was initiated by the DoD under the 2001 National Defense Act to remove paper transactions from all vital acquisition process that concerns the DoD. WAWF makes it mandatory for all payment requests for contract under the DoD to be submitted electronically. The intent here is to speed up the acquisition process and make it less cumbersome for government and vendors to do business.
WAWF functioned as a web-based, interactive application that enables vendors to receive reports and submit invoices electronically. Also, it enables the government to inspect project under contracts, accept the goods and services concerned, receives same and then pay electronically.
How does WAWF process work?
For a WAWF transaction process, a vendor should rout documents through the WAWF web-based system. You can do this by entering their DODAAC (Department of Defense Activity Address Code).
DODAAC is a unique, six position code that identify and verify an activity; it’s a unit or an organization that reserve the authority to request for or receive such materials.
What has change with the introduction of PIEE?
While all previous features and functions of the WAWF remain relevant, the new PIEE seeks to simplify the acquisition process further by expanding on WAWF’s functions and capabilities.
For example, the new PIEE Suite incorporated into the EDA all Data Lake as independent capability without recording any loss in reporting capabilities.
It provides more flexibility in working across different modules by targeting the end-to-end user experience.
The PIEE also eliminates the practice of submitting and resubmitting of documents to a government location; you can deactivate these documents (with regards to DoDAAC). This way, the PIEE correct the receiving reports and ensure they activate as per the location of active code.
The new PIEE reduces the level of stovepipe capabilities and makes it possible to accomplish procurements in phased approach.
Other capabilities available offered by the new PIEE Suite include:
- Stand alone sign-on access based on roles and job series
- Ability to pre-award, award or manage post-award
- Make payment quickly
- Manage property intrusively
- Buy card
- Close out contracts flawlessly
Considering that the new PIEE Suite comes with many features and enhanced capabilities, all contractors working with the DoD must strive to familiarize themselves with the system to support the administration process of their contracts. You can find more information about the Procurement Integrated Enterprise Environment here.
This blog was written by Linda Rawson, who is the founder of DynaGrace Enterprises (dynagrace.com) and the inventor of WeatherEgg (weatheregg.com). She, along with her daughter, Jennifer Remund make up the mother-daughter duo of 2BizChicks (2Bizchicks.com). For further information, please connect with Linda on LinkedIn, or contact her at (800) 676-0058 ext 101.
Please reach out to us at GovCon-Biz should you have any questions.
