A guide to on-line purchasing information.

• Author: Gleason, Nancy

Government officials understood the importance of buying well-made products for the best price long before Vice President Gore smashed an ashtray with a $500 hammer on "The Late Show with David Letterman." For decades, organizations such as the National Association of State Purchasing Officials (NASPO), the National Institute of Governmental Purchasing (NIGP), and the National Association of Purchasing Management (NAPM) have provided governments with information to improve their procurement process. The associations' information, however, is being presented in new ways, thanks to the prevalence of the Internet. In addition, as World Wide Web home pages become de rigueur for most organizations, more and more governments are providing vendors and other jurisdictions with purchasing information electronically.

Assistance for the Purchasing Officer

Each of the associations noted above has a home page on the Web, all of which provide information concerning membership services, education and training programs, publications and/or services offered, and other related information. In addition to this general information, each site offers specialized information to its on-line visitors, as described below. (The addresses for all Web sites described in this article appear in the accompanying side bar.)

The NASPO site offers a vendor's guide for doing business with states and a directory of state purchasing officials. A section on procurement reform offers an on-line copy of the report Buying Smart: State Procurement Reform Saves Millions, a joint publication of NASPO and the National Association of State Information Resource Executives (NASIRE). This report also can be accessed via the publications section of NASIRE's site (http://www.nasire.org). A database of recycled products, developed and maintained by the Florida Department of Management Services with funding from NASPO and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, is available at no charge (as of mid-March) to users who register.

The NIGP site offers a technical solutions section where on-line visitors can view or download a matrix that compares the features of several automated purchasing management software packages. A page of related links provides connections to several government purchasing or procurement divisions, including 26 states and some federal agencies, universities and school districts, counties, and cities. Another list provides links to such organizations as the Chartered...