FAC-C Federal Acquisition Certification in
Contracting Exam 2026 Study Guide |
Verified Practice Questions & Answers with
Detailed Rationales | Comprehensive
Certification Prep
FAC-C FEDERAL ACQUISITION CERTIFICATION IN CONTRACTING EXAM 2026
STUDY GUIDE Verified Practice Questions & Answers with Detailed Rationales
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DOCUMENT OVERVIEW:
• This comprehensive study guide contains 200 rigorously crafted practice
questions designed to prepare you for the FAC-C certification exam, covering all
major acquisition domains including regulations, contract types, pricing strategies,
ethics, and procurement procedures with verified answers.
• Study this material by working through each question, attempting to answer
before reviewing the correct response and rationale; focus on understanding the
reasoning behind each correct answer to build mastery of federal contracting
principles that you'll apply throughout your acquisition career.
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SECTION 1: FEDERAL ACQUISITION REGULATIONS & POLICY (Questions 1–30)
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1. Which regulation is the primary source of federal procurement rules and
procedures?
A) Office of Federal Procurement Policy Act
B) Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement (DFARS)
C) Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR)
D) Office of Management and Budget Circular A-76
,E) Code of Federal Regulations Title 48
CORRECT ANSWER: C) Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR)
Rationale: The Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) is the primary governing
regulation that establishes policies and procedures for federal procurement across
all civilian agencies. It applies to all executive agencies and contains the
fundamental requirements that all federal contracting actions must follow. While
DFARS supplements FAR for defense agencies and the OFPP Act provides statutory
authority, the FAR itself is the foundational regulatory framework.
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2. What is the primary objective of the Competition in Contracting Act (CICA)?
A) To eliminate all small business participation in federal contracting
B) To maximize competition in federal procurement and ensure fair opportunity for
contractors
C) To establish fixed pricing for all federal contracts
D) To centralize all procurement authority in a single federal agency
E) To eliminate the use of competitive sealed bids
CORRECT ANSWER: B) To maximize competition in federal procurement and
ensure fair opportunity for contractors
Rationale: The Competition in Contracting Act (CICA) was enacted to promote full
and open competition in federal procurement. Its primary objective is to ensure
that federal agencies obtain supplies, services, and construction through
competitive procurement methods that provide fair opportunity to all eligible
contractors. CICA requires contracting officers to use competitive procedures
except in limited justified circumstances.
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3. Which of the following best describes the scope of the FAR?
,A) It applies only to Department of Defense contracts
B) It applies to all executive agencies, including civilian and defense agencies
C) It applies only to contracts above $500,000
D) It applies only to construction contracts
E) It applies only to services contracts
CORRECT ANSWER: B) It applies to all executive agencies, including civilian
and defense agencies
Rationale: The FAR's applicability is broad and covers all executive agencies, both
civilian and defense. While agency-specific supplements like DFARS may add
additional requirements for specific agencies, the FAR provides the baseline
requirements for all federal procurement. The FAR applies regardless of contract
value or contract type (goods, services, or construction).
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
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4. What does the term "simplified acquisition threshold" refer to?
A) The minimum dollar amount required to conduct a competitive procurement
B) The maximum dollar amount for which simplified acquisition procedures may be
used
C) The threshold above which only Department of Defense contracts are authorized
D) The amount at which contract performance bonds become mandatory
E) The minimum amount for which a contracting officer warrant is required
CORRECT ANSWER: B) The maximum dollar amount for which simplified
acquisition procedures may be used
Rationale: The simplified acquisition threshold (currently $250,000, but changes by
regulation) is the ceiling amount for which contracting officers may use simplified
acquisition procedures. These procedures streamline the competitive process for
acquisitions below this threshold, reducing administrative burden while
, maintaining appropriate oversight. Above this threshold, more formal procurement
procedures apply.
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5. Which statutory authority established the Office of Federal Procurement
Policy (OFPP)?
A) Federal Property and Administrative Services Act
B) Office of Federal Procurement Policy Act
C) Competition in Contracting Act
D) Federal Acquisition Regulation
E) Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement
CORRECT ANSWER: B) Office of Federal Procurement Policy Act
Rationale: The Office of Federal Procurement Policy Act established the OFPP,
which is responsible for developing federal procurement policy and providing
guidance to federal agencies on acquisition matters. The OFPP, housed within OMB,
plays a crucial role in formulating government-wide acquisition policy and issuing
policy directives that affect all federal procurement activities.
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6. What is the primary purpose of the Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act
(FASA)?
A) To increase contract performance bond requirements
B) To streamline the federal procurement process and reduce administrative
burden
C) To eliminate small business subcontracting requirements
D) To establish fixed prices for all federal contracts
E) To centralize all acquisition authority in the Pentagon
Contracting Exam 2026 Study Guide |
Verified Practice Questions & Answers with
Detailed Rationales | Comprehensive
Certification Prep
FAC-C FEDERAL ACQUISITION CERTIFICATION IN CONTRACTING EXAM 2026
STUDY GUIDE Verified Practice Questions & Answers with Detailed Rationales
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
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━━
DOCUMENT OVERVIEW:
• This comprehensive study guide contains 200 rigorously crafted practice
questions designed to prepare you for the FAC-C certification exam, covering all
major acquisition domains including regulations, contract types, pricing strategies,
ethics, and procurement procedures with verified answers.
• Study this material by working through each question, attempting to answer
before reviewing the correct response and rationale; focus on understanding the
reasoning behind each correct answer to build mastery of federal contracting
principles that you'll apply throughout your acquisition career.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
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SECTION 1: FEDERAL ACQUISITION REGULATIONS & POLICY (Questions 1–30)
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1. Which regulation is the primary source of federal procurement rules and
procedures?
A) Office of Federal Procurement Policy Act
B) Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement (DFARS)
C) Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR)
D) Office of Management and Budget Circular A-76
,E) Code of Federal Regulations Title 48
CORRECT ANSWER: C) Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR)
Rationale: The Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) is the primary governing
regulation that establishes policies and procedures for federal procurement across
all civilian agencies. It applies to all executive agencies and contains the
fundamental requirements that all federal contracting actions must follow. While
DFARS supplements FAR for defense agencies and the OFPP Act provides statutory
authority, the FAR itself is the foundational regulatory framework.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
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2. What is the primary objective of the Competition in Contracting Act (CICA)?
A) To eliminate all small business participation in federal contracting
B) To maximize competition in federal procurement and ensure fair opportunity for
contractors
C) To establish fixed pricing for all federal contracts
D) To centralize all procurement authority in a single federal agency
E) To eliminate the use of competitive sealed bids
CORRECT ANSWER: B) To maximize competition in federal procurement and
ensure fair opportunity for contractors
Rationale: The Competition in Contracting Act (CICA) was enacted to promote full
and open competition in federal procurement. Its primary objective is to ensure
that federal agencies obtain supplies, services, and construction through
competitive procurement methods that provide fair opportunity to all eligible
contractors. CICA requires contracting officers to use competitive procedures
except in limited justified circumstances.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
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3. Which of the following best describes the scope of the FAR?
,A) It applies only to Department of Defense contracts
B) It applies to all executive agencies, including civilian and defense agencies
C) It applies only to contracts above $500,000
D) It applies only to construction contracts
E) It applies only to services contracts
CORRECT ANSWER: B) It applies to all executive agencies, including civilian
and defense agencies
Rationale: The FAR's applicability is broad and covers all executive agencies, both
civilian and defense. While agency-specific supplements like DFARS may add
additional requirements for specific agencies, the FAR provides the baseline
requirements for all federal procurement. The FAR applies regardless of contract
value or contract type (goods, services, or construction).
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
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4. What does the term "simplified acquisition threshold" refer to?
A) The minimum dollar amount required to conduct a competitive procurement
B) The maximum dollar amount for which simplified acquisition procedures may be
used
C) The threshold above which only Department of Defense contracts are authorized
D) The amount at which contract performance bonds become mandatory
E) The minimum amount for which a contracting officer warrant is required
CORRECT ANSWER: B) The maximum dollar amount for which simplified
acquisition procedures may be used
Rationale: The simplified acquisition threshold (currently $250,000, but changes by
regulation) is the ceiling amount for which contracting officers may use simplified
acquisition procedures. These procedures streamline the competitive process for
acquisitions below this threshold, reducing administrative burden while
, maintaining appropriate oversight. Above this threshold, more formal procurement
procedures apply.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
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5. Which statutory authority established the Office of Federal Procurement
Policy (OFPP)?
A) Federal Property and Administrative Services Act
B) Office of Federal Procurement Policy Act
C) Competition in Contracting Act
D) Federal Acquisition Regulation
E) Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement
CORRECT ANSWER: B) Office of Federal Procurement Policy Act
Rationale: The Office of Federal Procurement Policy Act established the OFPP,
which is responsible for developing federal procurement policy and providing
guidance to federal agencies on acquisition matters. The OFPP, housed within OMB,
plays a crucial role in formulating government-wide acquisition policy and issuing
policy directives that affect all federal procurement activities.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
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6. What is the primary purpose of the Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act
(FASA)?
A) To increase contract performance bond requirements
B) To streamline the federal procurement process and reduce administrative
burden
C) To eliminate small business subcontracting requirements
D) To establish fixed prices for all federal contracts
E) To centralize all acquisition authority in the Pentagon
