As anyone in the federal contracting line of work knows, deadlines come at you fast and hard. In a recent GAO decision, GAO refused to relax the timeliness rules associated with protests of solicitation requirements, even where that left the contractor with very little time to protest.
Continue readingTag Archives: GAO bid protests
Option to “Postpone” Required Pre-Award Debriefing Until After Award—Gain Information, But Lose Right to Protest
GAO’s bid protest window for debriefings—which closes 10 days after the required debriefing—knows very few exceptions. But what if the agency offers you a more informative post-award debriefing in place of the pre-award debriefing normally required upon your elimination from the competitive range? This option will likely improve your ability to compete for future contracts with the agency. Shouldn’t you be able to accept it without giving up your right to protest? GAO says no.
Continue readingGAO Allows Contracting Officer Discretion to Act as Tie-Breaker
Your company has submitted a proposal for a Lowest-Priced, Technically Acceptable acquisition. To your surprise, you find out another company has submitted a technically acceptable offer with the same price. Equally surprising, the solicitation does not contain any provisions instructing the agency on how to pick from otherwise equal bids. So what is the contracting officer to do – issue an order for a standoff, a la the O.K. Corral? (For the record, we do not advise this as a viable method of conflict resolution.)
Fortunately, GAO encourages a less drastic solution–use of the contracting officer’s reasonable discretion.
Continue readingPre-Solicitation Notices not Grounds for Protests, GAO says
Like my alarm clock ringing on Monday mornings, GAO recently reminded protestors that protests based on pre-solicitation notices are just too early.
In F-Star Zaragosa Port, LLC; F-Star Socorro Holding, LLC, B-417414, et al. (Comp. Gen. Apr. 15, 2019), GAO dismissed protests based on pre-solicitation notices as premature.
Continue readingGAO Won’t Resolve Alleged Corporate Espionage Dispute
In a recent GAO bid protest, IBM Corp. accused a subcontractor of giving its proposal to a competitor.
GAO dismissed the accusation, explaining that at its core, alleged corporate espionage is a disagreement between two parties, not a contractor and the federal government and therefore not an appropriate matter for resolution in a bid protest.
Continue readingGAO: Agencies Must Consider Information Gathered by Reverse Auction Providers
What are federal contractors supposed to do when FedBid (now Unison) requests additional information related to a proposal and the awarding agency ignores that information in its awarding decision?
GAO recently held that the agency must consider all information gathered by reverse auction providers.
Continue readingGAO: Past Performance Should Relate to Solicited Services
Past performance is an important evaluation factor in many solicitations. Essentially, it allows an agency to guess as to the likelihood of an offeror’s successful performance under a solicitation by looking to its history of performance on similar projects in the past.
GAO recently confirmed it is “axiomatic” that past performance examples should align with the solicitation’s requirements. If an offeror submits unrelated examples, it risks a downgraded past performance score.
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