The U.S. Treasury Department is reopening bidding on its US$1 billion communications contract.

The three-year Treasury Communications Enterprise contract -- with seven one-year options -- is for telecommunications services and support to more than 1,000 domestic locations and tens of thousands of agency users in the U.S. and overseas.

The contract, initially won by AT&T Corp. last December, was canceled in May after protests from other bidders were reviewed and sustained by the Government Accountability Office.

The bidders who protested the award to AT&T were Broadwing Communications LLC, Level 3 Communications Inc., MCI Inc., Northrup Grumman Information Technology and Qwest Government Services. A seventh bidder on the contract -- Sprint International Communications Corp. -- did not submit a protest.

In its decision, the GAO said the Treasury Department hadn"t had discussions with all of the bidders and it told the department to do so.

After canceling its deal with AT&T, the Treasury Department said it would use the existing General Services Administration (GSA) programs to meet its communications requirements.

In a statement e-mailed to Computerworld Thursday, the department said that after the GAO"s decision in March, Treasury officials evaluated whether any GSA contract could meet its telecommunications needs.

Based on that review, the department determined the GSA"s contracts did not meet its communications needs, so it is now moving forward again with its own procurement process.

The department also said it will implement the GAO"s recommendation to renegotiate with the other bidders and will give the vendors that had previously submitted proposals an opportunity to submit revised bids. Treasury officials did not give a timeline for the process.

The GAO could not be reached for comment.