SmallGovCon Week In Review: January 6 – January 10, 2020

Posted on January 10, 2020 by Shane McCall

Hope everyone had a great holiday season! Now it’s time to get back to the routine. And for those of us in the northern parts of the county–a few more months to walk in a winter wonderland.

To avoid that post-holiday letdown, enjoy some of these federal contracting updates that have been rolling in since my last update. This week, there are interesting stories including the new SBA administrator being confirmed, Space Force seeking innovative tech solutions, and calls for federal purchasing to change more quickly.

OHA Reiterates that Filing Deadlines Cannot be Extended

Posted on January 9, 2020 by SmallGovConContributor

As I’m sure most other attorneys can commiserate with, I often have a recurring nightmare that I miss a filing deadline. Doing so can lead to terrible results: dismissed cases and, in some cases, sanctions against the attorney. For this reason, we always check, double-check, and triple-check our filing deadlines, and strive to file documents early, when possible.

Given my fear, I gain no pleasure in reading about missed filing deadlines, especially when the goof is the subject of a matter outside the attorney’s control.

But as a recent decision by the SBA’s Office of Hearings and Appeals demonstrates, even the most sympathetic of excuses won’t excuse a late appeal filing.

Email Isn’t Instant: GAO Dismisses Case Where Proposal was Four Minutes Late

Posted on January 8, 2020 by SmallGovConContributor

By 2020, most of us have gotten used to almost immediate means of digital communication. We expect emails to reach their destination at lightning-fast speeds—but this isn’t always the case.

Relying on this expectation can have devastating effects, as it did for a protester in one recent GAO case.

GAO Sustains Challenge Based on Misrepresentation of Incumbent Staff Availability

Posted on January 7, 2020 by Nicole Pottroff

It’s generally a pretty high bar to argue the ol’ “bait and switch” concerning what personnel will actually perform a contract. But specifically naming a crucial employee of the incumbent in your proposal—without ever talking to that employee about working on the new contract—can meet the bar in a GAO protest.

GAO: Proposal Evaluations Can’t Take Place in La La Land

Posted on January 6, 2020 by SmallGovConContributor

Wouldn’t it be swell to simply erase those less-than-flattering moments from your past merely by deleting them? For instance, what if your biographer simply omitted any mention of you being excited for and seeing the apparently horrible new Cats movie?

Does erasing a historical fact–such as an unfavorable detail from a proposal–mean that it never happened?

SmallGovCon Year in Review: The Top Ten

Posted on January 3, 2020 by Shane McCall

As we reflect on the end of 2019 and look forward to what 2020 will bring, it’s interesting to see what was noteworthy to our readers in 2019. To that end, I’ve compiled a list of some of our most popular posts from 2019.

2020 will certainly bring many more changes in the federal contracting world and SmallGovCon will be here to provide insight on all of them.

Happy New Year from SmallGovCon!

Posted on December 31, 2019 by Shane McCall

As we wind down 2019, all of us at SmallGovCon would like to wish our readers a happy and prosperous 2020! No doubt the new year will bring plenty of regulatory changes, impactful decisions, and other important updates in the federal contracting world. We’ll help you keep a handle on it.