DoD Withholds $25.7M Payment To Pratt & Whitney For F135

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http://breakingdefense.com/2014/04/dod-withholds-25-7m-payment-to-pratt-whitney-for-f135/

DoD Withholds $25.7M Payment To Pratt & Whitney For F135
By Colin Clark on April 08, 2014 at 4:55 PM

CAPITOL HILL: As F-35 program officials prepared to testify to the Senate Armed Services Committee, they announced they were keeping back some $25.7 million, or 5 percent, of payments for the F135 engine used in the Joint Strike Fighter.

“Due to decertification of their Earned Value Management Process by the Defense Contract Management Agency, Pratt & Whitney is subject to a 5% withhold against all F135 propulsion deliveries,” F-35 spokesman Joe DellaVedova said in an email. ”The total of this withhold as of end of February is $25.7M. This money will be held back by DCMA until the company fixes their internal business system used to track cost and schedule performance.”

The money withheld varies “from engine-to-engine and lot-to-lot.”

A Pratt & Whitney representative at the hearing, Matthew Bates, argued the company has “received approval from the DCMA on 95 percent of our corrective action plans and anticipate approval of all corrective action plans soon.”