Scope Multi-Site Facilities Services Without Erasing Local Requirements

What should a core service standard define once for every site?

Start with what the work must achieve. Under FAR Subpart 37.6, a performance-based service contract includes a performance work statement, measurable performance standards with a method of assessing performance, and incentives where appropriate. In the same subpart, agencies are told to describe the work, to the maximum extent practicable, in terms of the required results rather than how it is done or the number of hours provided. That is a federal rule, but the logic carries over to a private portfolio.

In this guide's view, the core standard should define each service line once: the result, the measure, how the measure is checked and how the service is priced. Keep a few key inputs where an output cannot be checked, such as a named access control or a regulated cleaning method. Leave headcount and hours out of the core, and record them in a site schedule only where a site has a reason to fix them.

Which differences belong in a local site schedule?

According to the RICS standard on procuring facility management, the key element of scope is the buildings, sites or land each service line covers. The same standard advises buyers running regional or global procurements to keep specifications as consistent as possible while recognising that service requirements vary between locations, and to set those variations out clearly. Labor agreements can differ too: under the federal service contract rules, where bargained wage rates differ between locations, the contracting officer identifies which locations each agreement covers.

In this guide's view, a site schedule should hold only differences that have a reason: a local law or permit, a safety requirement, a labor agreement, operating hours, access rules or equipment the other sites do not have. Give each line an owner at the site and a reason the procurement team can check. A difference without a reason is a preference, and it belongs in a change request rather than the scope.

How should site orders stay inside the parent agreement?

Under the ordering rule in FAR 16.505, each order must describe all the services clearly enough that its full price can be set when the order is placed. The same rule says orders must be within the contract's scope, issued within its period of performance and within its maximum value. For a commercial master services agreement with site schedules, those are three useful tests before any site order is signed.

Keep the parent agreement responsible for the shared terms: the service standards, the measurement method, the rate card, liability and change control. Each site order then names the premises, the services and frequencies that apply there, the local schedule and the price built from the agreed fixed, unit and labor rates. If a site needs a service the parent agreement does not cover, treat it as a scope change at portfolio level rather than a local addition.

How can frequencies change without renegotiating the contract?

Flexibility has to be designed in. In a 1997 conference paper on construction contracts, Norazam Othman notes that changing circumstances demand flexibility and that contracts therefore carry clauses allowing changes to the specification. The same paper reports that variations are blamed for delays, disputes and conflict, and argues that contracts should be drafted to reflect the parties' needs when circumstances change. In this guide's view, facilities services face a similar tension when demand changes.

According to the RICS standard, each service element should have its own pricing methodology, chosen with volume variation, input cost predictability and risk in mind. The standard also notes that a buyer may require visibility of profit, overheads, indexation, mark-ups and a schedule of rates. In this guide's view, price variable work such as periodic cleaning per unit from that schedule, and set the range within which site orders can move frequencies without an amendment. Set the low end of each range no lower than any frequency a law, insurer or equipment maker requires at that site.

Why do labor rates differ by site, and how should pricing show it?

Wage levels differ widely by location. In May 2023, the BLS wage estimates for janitors put the mean hourly wage at $20.87 in New York and $14.93 in Texas. For facilities managers, the corresponding BLS estimates were $65.14 an hour in New York and $49.98 in Florida. A single national rate would hide gaps of that size.

For US federal service contracts the difference is also a legal requirement. Under the Service Contract Labor Standards rules, where no predecessor contractor's collective bargaining agreement applies, covered contractors pay at least the wages and fringe benefits the Department of Labor finds prevail in the locality. Under the same rules, a contracting officer who can identify all the possible places of performance obtains a wage determination for each locality. Private buyers face their own state and local wage laws, which this guide does not survey.

Say which work is priced at a fixed or unit price and which through the labor rate card. Ask bidders to price labor with a column for each location or wage zone and to show the wage basis behind each rate. Occupational wage estimates describe what employees earn, not what a contract costs, so do not read them as bill rates. They are useful for spotting a site rate that is far out of line with the local labor market.

How should performance standards be tiered across sites?

Measure every site the same way for the core services. According to the RICS standard, a KPI needs a frequency, typically monthly, quarterly or annually, and a method of measurement and reporting. In federal performance-based acquisition, the government may prepare a quality assurance surveillance plan or ask offerors to propose one.

In a Delphi study of facilities outsourcing in Hong Kong, client and service-provider panels rated thirty-five success factors, and both leaned toward measurement of performance and cost effectiveness. The panels were small, with fourteen client and eight provider participants, so treat this as expert opinion rather than measured results.

In this guide's view, keep one set of core KPIs, measured and reported identically at every site, so results can be compared across the portfolio. Add a local KPI only where a site carries a risk the others do not, such as a laboratory, a data room or a public counter, and record it in that site's schedule with its reason.

What should a core-plus-local scope register contain?

Use the register below to agree, before the request for proposals goes out, which parts of the scope are fixed for every site and which belong in a site schedule. Carry the agreed register into the guide to structured RFQ workflows so bidders price the same structure, and assess bidders' delivery risk with the guide to tiered supplier risk assessment.

How do AI agents change multi-site facilities scoping?