Tariff guidance
Goods and services
As the state’s procurement authority, DES is receiving requests for guidance from agencies about around tariffs' potential effects on their procurements. DES is also receiving questions about the statewide contracts that are used by state agencies, local governments, tribes, and qualified nonprofits.
Agency Procurements
DES recommends that agencies do not change their existing contracts to include tariff impacts for most agency contracts. In most cases, an agency procurement will reflect current pricing which would include any relevant tariff as part of the regular cost, and no special procedure is needed. This would be for any contract where there is a single purchase or purchase within a few months of the contract signature. In those cases, the tariff impact should have been reasonably anticipated and included in pricing.
The potential change to agency contracts might be considered for long-term purchases subject to tariffs or where the purchase of the goods occurs at multiple times throughout the term of the contract. Please note that agencies should be mindful that a change in pricing due to tariffs must not make the contract exceed the agency delegated authority.
Resources for tariffs
DES provided resources to support agencies in addressing any tariff impacts on their own contracts and procurements. Find these documents in the Washington State Procurement Manual | Department of Enterprise Services (DES):
Additional tariff resources:
Statewide Contracts
DES is monitoring the tariff updates and communicating with statewide contractors about actual and anticipated tariff impacts to their industries. For most statewide contracts, tariffs are unexpected by the marketplace and reasonably were not incorporated into the contract pricing.
As statewide contracts commonly are five to six years long, and purchases using the statewide contract can occur at any point during that time, the unique and unpredictable nature of new tariffs may be more impactful on the prices of goods over the lifetime of the statewide contract than it may be under a single-purchase contract.
So far, DES has only received a few tariff-based requests for price increases. These requests are mostly for goods that utilize steel or aluminum imports where high tariff impacts potentially make purchase fulfillment impractical. DES does not anticipate tariff-based impacts to contracts for services or goods that are not subject to a high-impact tariff.
Upon receipt of a contractor request for a tariff-based price increase, our first consideration is whether the contractor absorbs a portion of tariff-related costs as business expenses. DES is doing everything we can to negotiate this result on as many of our statewide contracts as possible.
When DES receives a price increase request from a contractor, we carefully assess it based on the unique circumstances in that particular industry. DES uses due diligence to help ensure the impact of a tariff is validated for the goods included in the contract, and that any price adjustment is fair and appropriate. As an example, actions DES takes for tariff-based price increase include:
- Require the contractor to provide supporting documentation to demonstrate tariff impact.
- Conduct our own market research to verify that the request is fair, reasonable, and charged to similarly situated purchasers.
- Reject any preemptive price increase requests based on anticipated tariff impacts or tariffs with a minor impact on the contract subject matter and prices.
For any statewide contracts that receive temporary tariff pricing adjustments, DES will update the contract summary webpage to show which products and/or contractors are impacted. This information will help purchasers make the best buying decisions, especially where is an opportunity to consider alternative products or other contractors on a multi-award statewide contract.
Questions? Please email [email protected].
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