# System for Award Management The government-wide database, run by the General Services Administration, where companies register to do business with the federal government and where exclusions are published. Its exclusions section is the successor to the Excluded Parties List System. Its practical importance is that it is mandatory reading. A contracting officer must check it before award, and agencies may not solicit offers from, award contracts to, or consent to subcontracts with a listed party absent a written determination of compelling reasons. Each exclusion record carries the acting agency, the cause, the effect of the exclusion and its termination date, and agencies have three working days from an action taking effect to enter it. Because the list is public, it is also the mechanism that makes an exclusion a reputational event rather than only a procurement one — which is part of why the negotiated exit that keeps a company off it is worth so much. The route in and out of the list is mapped at [[How a Federal Contractor Is Suspended and Debarred]]. ## See also - [[How a Federal Contractor Is Suspended and Debarred]] - [[Federal Awardee Performance and Integrity Information System]] - [[GSA]]