Chapter 15 - Small IT Purchase Procedures

The Virginia Information Technologies Agency (VITA) has procurement authority for all information technology (IT) goods and services for agencies and non-exempt institutions of higher education. See Chapter 1 of this manual, Purpose and Scope, for further information on VITA's IT procurement authority as well as VITA's Authority and Delegation Policy for IT procurements and exemptions.

An IT procurement is considered a "small purchase" when the aggregate or sum of all phases of the procurement is not expected to exceed $200,000. Emergency procurements of goods and services available on an existing statewide contract are not subject to VITA's small purchase requirements.

The delegated authority for IT goods and services is provided in the Authority and Delegation Policy located at the following URL: https://www.vita.virginia.gov/supply- chain/scm-policies-forms/scm-policies/

• All agencies have up to $250,000 in delegated authority for IT that is out of scope to VITA (e.g. agency specific applications). For a list of in scope and out of scope goods and services,  please visit the "Procurement Procedures" page at this URL: https://www.vita.virginia.gov/procurement/policies--procedures/procurement-procedures/.
• Procurements between $200,000 (small purchase limit) and $250,000 (VITA's delegated authority amount) must be procured competitively utilizing competitive sealed bidding or competitive negotiation.
• Delegated authority for IT that is in scope to VITA varies as follows:
  • All agencies have $0 in delegated authority for Cloud Services (Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service(PaaS), and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)).
  • Agencies that are not in scope to VITA services have$250,000 in delegated authority for infrastructure and enterprise applications.
  • Agencies that are in scope to VITA services have $0 in delegated authority for infrastructure and enterprise applications.

Procurement requests and orders shall not be split to circumvent delegation limits.

Before performing a small dollar purchase for IT goods or services, agencies and institutions should search the IT statewide contracts available on VITA's Web site at: https://vita.cobblestonesystems.com/public/.

Reviewing VITA's available statewide contracts allows agencies and institutions to determine if the technology product or service needed can be purchased through an existing competitively procured IT statewide contract. Use of VITA's statewide contracts is mandatory for the acquisition of all IT goods and services, including small purchases. If there is not a VITA statewide contract available for the needed IT good or service, a procurement will be conducted. At any time, an agency may request that a small dollar technology purchase be procured on its behalf by VITA by completing and e-mailing the requisition form, which can be found by logging into your agency's eVA account. 

Agencies shall utilize eVA for e-Mall, quick quote and catalog purchasing to meet the number of quotations ultimately required for each dollar threshold limit. As required by §2.2-4303(G) of the Code of Virginia, purchases that are expected to exceed $30,000 shall require a written informal solicitation of a minimum of four bidders or offerors. eVA's functionality can provide the needed minimum written quotes required by §2.2-4303 (G). Agencies and institutions may also utilize eVA's e-Mall, quick-quote, catalog purchasing functionality as well as DSBSD's Web site for solicitations where the transaction is between
$5,000 and the dollar limit ($250,000).

All procurements for cloud-based solutions (Software as a Service), regardless of dollar amount, are subject to agency compliance with the requirements in VITA's Third Party Use Policy located at this URL: https://www.vita.virginia.gov/technology-services/catalog-services/cloud-services/cloud-third-party-use-policy/.