“What a Difference a Day Makes,” goes the classic song.
For one contractor, a day–or rather, two days–made a big difference in its proposal evaluation. Although the solicitation called for offerors to save laboratory specimens for 7 days, the offeror’s proposal stated that it saves specimens “5-7 days.” Not surprisingly, the GAO found that the procuring agency properly assigned the offeror a weakness.
Here’s hoping that you had a wonderful Thanksgiving, full of relaxation, family time, football and lots of food.
For one Arizona contractor, the holiday was a little less festive this year, after the contractor lost out on a Navy cost-reimbursement contract–in part because the Navy unilaterally upped some of the contractor’s proposed labor rates. The GAO found nothing wrong with the agency’s decision, holding that the Navy reasonably determined that the contractor’s proposed labor rates were unrealistically low.
If your high school teacher or college professor had asked you to compose an essay up to five pages in length, would you expect an “A” for writing a single paragraph?
Probably not, and the same principle applies when it comes to proposals. In a recent GAO bid protest decision, the agency gave contractors up to five pages to describe each past performance reference. Not surprisingly, the GAO held that it was reasonable for the procuring agency to downgrade an offeror’s past performance score when that offeror only provided a one-paragraph write-up of each project.
“We’ll tell you how we’ll manage the contract–after you award it to us.”
That, in essence, appeared to be the position taken by one contractor recently in response to a Department of Defense solicitation. The contractor in question failed to provide an operations and management plan required by the solicitation, pledging to provide it after award. Not surprisingly, the agency assigned the contractor an “unacceptable” score. And equally unsurprising, the GAO denied the contractor’s bid protest.
Small government contractors sometimes rely on subcontractors to help satisfy experience, certification, past performance, and other solicitation requirements. But if one recent GAO bid protest decision is an indication of things to come, procuring agencies may begin requiring more information up front about major subcontractors–including a copy of the final subcontract agreement itself.
“I’m thinking of a number between one and ten–can you guess what it is?”
It sounds like the beginning of an amateur magic trick, or perhaps a segment on the ever-popular Colbert Report. But in a recent GAO bid protest decision, the stakes of the guessing game were a lot higher. In that case, the agency developed an internal estimate of the staffing needed to successfully complete the contract work, but did not disclose the estimate to offerors–then downgraded two offerors for failing to “guess” the same staffing numbers as the agency.
Unfortunately for the agency, the GAO refused to play along.
During the NFL’s recent replacement referee debacle, the rules of the game sometimes seemed to be in flux. San Francisco coach Jim Harbaugh, for instance, convinced the replacement refs to give him two extra challenges by playing dumb about how the challenge process works. But with the “real” referees back on the field, NFL teams now know that they once again need to play by the rules.
When it comes to proposals, contractors, too, need to play by the rules. An agency solicitation sets forth the ground rules of the competition, and varying from those stated rules can result in an unacceptable offer–as one contractor recently discovered when it attempted to amend the solicitation’s pricing table.