GAO Update

GAO Denies Protest Involving "Neutral" Past Performance Rating

The GAO recently denied a protest to the award of a contract for lifeguard services at Andersen AFB, Guam. The protester took issue with the fact that it was assigned a "Neutral" past performance rating, indicating that it had no similar past performance, despite its experience managing the swim team on base. The GAO repeated its position that evaluation of past performance is within the discretion of the agency and that it will only review the evaluations to ensure that the agency's judgment was reasonable and consistent with the solicitation criteria and applicable statutes and regulations. The GAO found the evaluation unobjectionable in this case because the performance work statement for the solicitation required the contractor to provide services sufficiently different from what was required to manage the swim team. Before assigning a "Neutral" past performance rating, be sure to do the appropriate analysis to determine that the requirements of the current solicitation are sufficiently divergent from those of the offeror's past contracts to justify the rating.

Greater Pacific Aquatics, B-29765 From Steve Copetas, DAU South


GAO Denies Protest Where SSA Follows Minority Recommendation

In TruLogic, Inc, B-297252.3 (Jan 06), GAO denied the protest of a contract awarded at Tinker AFB for Interactive Electronic Technical Manual (IETM) systems development and Technical Order (TO) "sustainment." GAO found that the source selection authority's (SSA) disagreement with the majority of the evaluators and acceptance of the minority's recommendation that the awardee be selected for award was unobjectionable and was not evidence of a lack of impartiality, where the SSA reached a reasoned conclusion, supported by the record, that the awardee's lower-priced, lower-rated proposal deserved a higher technical rating than was assigned by the majority and represented the best value to the government. This opinion reinforces the importance of the SSA/contracting officer's thorough explanation of the reasoning behind the award decision in the record-especially when following a minority recommendation.

TruLogic, Inc. From Steve Copetas, DAU South

Another GAO Case

Novex Enterprises, B-297660; B-297660.2, March 6, 2006

DIGEST
Agency unreasonably selected higher-priced proposal based on the fact that its initial delivery was somewhat earlier than the protester’s, where the awardee’s overall delivery schedule was noncompliant with the delivery schedule established in the solicitation and significantly less advantageous than the protester’s compliant delivery schedule, and the agency apparently did not consider this in making the award selection.

DECISION
We sustain the protest.