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K-State Today

October 7, 2020

Updates made to purchasing procedures policy

Submitted by Tara Fronce

The COVID-19 pandemic has presented the Division of Financial Services with the opportunity to accelerate business process improvements to support the university community. As an immediate response to the pandemic, K-State Purchasing enacted emergency purchasing protocols to ensure rapid response to COVID-related purchasing requests and implemented an electronic workflow tool and electronic vendor bid submission portal.

As a continued response to the pandemic and the need for ongoing business process improvement, a full purchasing policy review and improvement analysis was completed over the summer. Based on the analysis, the purchasing and contracting workflow was streamlined and significant updates were made to K-State's Policies and Procedures Manual, Chapter 6310 Purchasing Procedures, effective Oct. 1. Changes were made to provide campus units more flexibility in the bid solicitation processes for small and intermediate dollar solicitations and to expedite the bid process. Key changes include the following:

  • Unit heads may now delegate a purchasing liaison to have bid solicitation authority up to $50,000 and may utilize a simplified solicitation process.
  • Purchases $10,000 up to $50,000 in units without a delegated purchasing liaison will use the enhanced solicitation process. K-State Purchasing will facilitate the process with input from the campus unit. In most cases, K-State Purchasing will utilize a simplified solicitation process for these intermediate purchases.
  • Purchases $50,000 or greater are completed using the enhanced solicitation process and facilitated by K-State Purchasing utilizing a new form to gather solicitation information in order to streamline the request for proposal process.
  • A new Waiver of Solicitation, formerly called Prior Authorization, form was created with exemption categories to expedite the purchasing process for items that cannot be competitively bid.

K-State Purchasing will host training sessions to help educate campus partners on these policy updates. Individuals interested in learning more about the updated purchasing policy may visit the Purchasing training page and are encouraged to attend one of the training sessions offered via Zoom. No registration is required.

Contact K-State Purchasing at kspurch@k-state.edu or 785-532-6214 with questions.