GAO bid protest decisions, commentary on GAO bid protest regulations, and related topics.
Agencies must notify offerors when price realism will be evaluated under a fixed price solicitation.
Recently, the GAO sustained a protest where a procuring agency rejected an offeror’s proposal because the offeror’s quoted prices were significantly lower than the government’s estimate–even though the solicitation did not notify offerors that price realism would be evaluated.
An agency’s evaluation of proposals was not improper even though the Source Selection Authority “cut and paste” portions of a selection document used in a similar procurement–including typographical errors and a reference to a firm that had not submitted a proposal.
The GAO’s recent decision highlights an uncomfortable truth of government contracting: while the government can (and often does) demand nearly perfect proposals, the government may be able to get by with sloppy or lazy evaluations.
The VA’s decision not to issue a SDVOSB set-aside was improper because the VA adopted an unreasonably narrow approach to determining whether two or more SDVOSBs were likely to submit proposals.
In a recent bid protest decision, the GAO held that the VA’s narrow market research did not support its set-aside determination. And in so holding, the GAO reaffirmed its position that the VA must put “veterans first” in federal procurements.
After a protest was filed at the GAO, a procuring agency delayed implementing the mandatory statutory suspension of work, then amended the awardee’s contract to permit the awardee to fully perform before the suspension actually kicked in.
Then the agency got caught.
In a recent decision, the GAO sustained a protest because the agency had circumvented the GAO’s bid protest process. But while the agency got busted–a good thing–the penalty it will pay is less than satisfactory.
GAO lacks jurisdiction to decide a protest relating to a solicitation under which the government will receive de minimis value.
De minimis is a fancy Latin term meaning, essentially, “not much.” In one recent bid protest decision, GAO held that it lacked jurisdiction to consider a protester’s challenge to the terms of a solicitation because the solicitation called for the contractor to purchase scrap metal from the government, not the other way around.
Under the GAO’s bid protest rules, an offeror is not presumed to have knowledge of information published on the Army’s Single Face to Industry (ASFI) website.
In a recent bid protest decision, the GAO held that an offeror did not have “constructive knowledge” of an amendment posted on the ASFI because, unlike FedBizOpps, the ASFI has not been designated as a government-wide point of entry for the publication of solicitations.
An agency’s preaward notice did not start the “clock ticking” for an unsuccessful competitor’s subsequent GAO bid protest.
In a recent decision, the GAO held that the protesters were not required to file their GAO bid protests within 10 days of receiving the agency’s preaward notice because the protests were based on an allegation that the agency had failed to conduct a price realism evaluation–and the protesters were not made aware of the awardee’s price in the preaward notice.