Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Thursday, May 29, 2014, 9:45pm EST System Studies & Simulation, Inc., B-409375.2, B-409375.3, May 12, 2014 Deciding on the prices to offer in response to a solicitation for a federal government contract is not exactly an easy process. It requires a multitude
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Wednesday, May 16, 2014, 11:22am EST MindPoint Group, LLC, B-409562, May 8, 2014 A common issue that faces many employers is the question of whether an individual working for them should be classified as an employee or an independent contractor. This issue typically arises
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Tuesday, May 6, 2014, 6:29pm EST Watts-Obayashi, Joint Venture; Black Construction Corp., B-409391, et al., April 4, 2014 There’s an old saying about what happens when you assume something, but this is a family article series, so I’ll let you Google that one on
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Wednesday, April 25, 2014, 5:41pm EST SumCo Eco-Contracting LLC, B-409434, B-409434.2, April 15, 2014 A company’s past experience often comes into play when an agency is going through the evaluation process in a procurement. In many cases, the procuring agency will evaluate a
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, April 18, 2014, 6:47pm EST McGoldrick Construction Services Corporation, B-409252.2, March 28, 2014 In theory, the government procurement process is relatively simple. A government agency determines it has a need for goods or services, and issues a solicitation to the public. The solicitation
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, April 11, 2014, 2:29pm EST Hamilton Pacific Chamberlain, LLC, B-409208.2, April 3, 2014 Several recent articles have discussed relatively minor issues that cost a contractor an opportunity for an award. We’ve seen an offeror fail to respond to a solicitation amendment, an
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Monday, March 31, 2014, 7:00pm EST Business Integra, Inc., B-407273.22, February 27, 2014 There are a host of products where 99.9% effectiveness is perfectly acceptable to meet our needs. For example, someone worried about germs would probably consider a hand sanitizer claiming to be
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, March 21, 2014, 10:00am EST DJW Consulting, LLC, B-408846.3, December 18, 2013 In our last article, we discussed a case in which an offeror basically disqualified itself from further consideration for award after failing to respond to a discussion letter sent by the
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Monday, March 17, 2014, 11:49am EST MOWA Barlovento, LLC-JV, B-408445, September 12, 2013 There is the old philosophical question: if a tree falls in the forest, but no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound? There is no need for
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Thursday, March 6, 2014, 7:00pm EST Wolf Creek Federal Services, Inc., B-409187, -.2, -.3, February 6, 2014 Affiliation can be a significant concern for a company wishing to compete for government contracts as a small business. Companies are generally considered to be affiliated with
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, February 21, 2014, 5:30pm EST Motorola Solutions, Inc., B-409148, B-409148.2, January 28, 2014 In a previous article, we discussed the fact that it is difficult for the government to maintain any kind of brand loyalty. Typically, when an agency is seeking to
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Thursday, February 13, 2014, 2:50pm EST Iyabak Construction, LLC, B-409196, February 6, 2014 Agencies procuring goods and services generally know what they need better than anyone else. It is for this reason that agencies are given a great deal of discretion when
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, February 7, 2014, 4:10pm EST Science Applications International Corporation, B-408307.2, January 27, 2013 We have previously discussed the issue of discussions, and that when an agency holds discussions with offerors, those discussions must be meaningful. To be meaningful, the agency must
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, January 31, 2014, 11:42am EST Kardex Remstar, LLC, B-409030, January 17, 2014 It is not uncommon in a federal procurement for the contracting agency to communicate with offerors regarding their proposals before making an award decision. How the agency conducts these communications
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, January 24, 2014, 4:34pm EST HRCI-MPSC PASS, LLC, B-408919, B-408919.2, January 8, 2014 A benefit of filing a bid protest with the GAO is that meeting certain filing deadlines will invoke an automatic stay. The automatic stay hits the metaphorical pause button on
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Wednesday, January 10, 2014, 4:01pm EST Logistics Network, Inc., B-408995, January 6, 2014 Because the federal procurement system is designed to promote competition, it is difficult for the Federal Government to maintain loyalty to any particular brand. Thus, even in cases where an agency
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Thursday, January 2, 2014, 5:23pm EST CACI-WGI, Inc., B-408520.2, December 16, 2013 As a new year dawns, some people will tell you now is a good time to sit down and reflect on the experiences of the past year. Others will tell you
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, December 20, 2013, 1:52pm EST Empire Veteran Group, Inc., B-408866.2, B-4088663., December 17, 2013 Recently, we have addressed deadlines for filing GAO bid protests challenging the terms of a solicitation and also following an agency-level protest. A recent decision released by GAO
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, December 13, 2013, 10:30am EST RDT-Semper Tek JV, LLC, B-408811, December 9, 2013 JV Derichebourg-BMAR & Associates, LLC, B-408777, November 20, 2013 Tom Coughlin, the Super Bowl winning head coach of the New York Giants, is somewhat notorious for his insistence that if
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Wednesday, December 5, 2013, 4:57pm EST AXIS Management Group LLC, B-408575, November 13, 2013 Anyone who had to do chores as a kid can surely relate to the feeling of being given the ability to complete a task according to your own method, only
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Wednesday, November 21, 2013, 6:32pm EST DAI, Inc., B-408625, B-408625.2, November 6, 2013 A few weeks ago, we discussed the deadline for filing a bid protest with GAO challenging the terms of a solicitation. That case demonstrated that GAO’s bid protest regulations require challenges to a
*** On this Veterans Day the Bid Protest Weekly would like to extend heartfelt thanks to all the brave men and women in the Armed Forces—past, present, and future—for their service to our country*** Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Monday, November 11, 2013, 10:00am EST Trailboss Enterprises, Inc., B-407093,
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, November 1, 2013, 5:22pm EST AmaTerra Environmental Inc., B-408290.2, October 23, 2013 Most basketball fans can probably describe to you the frustration and heartbreak that comes along with seeing your favorite team make a game-winning shot, only for the shot to not
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, October 25, 2013, 1:20pm EST Coburn Contractors, LLC, B-408279.2, September 30, 2013 In competing on a federal procurement, contractors are supposed to submit their proposals according to the rules and guidelines established by the solicitation. By holding all offerors to the same set
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, October 18, 2013, 6:40pm EST Harbor Services, Inc., B-408325, August 23, 2013 Often in the evaluation of proposals in a negotiated procurement, the corporate experience of the offerors will be a factor under consideration. Generally, offerors that are new entities and therefore
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Wednesday, October 11, 2013, 11:05am EST Triad International Maintenance Corporation, B-408374, Sept. 5, 2013 We have discussed the issue of price realism a few times over the last several months. It is fairly common for price realism to be confused with price reasonableness. Similar
The government shutdown is having a significant impact across the country, so it is not a surprise that it has been a hot topic on various news programs. Bid Protest Weekly editor Bryan King was a guest on In Depth with Francis Rose on Federal News Radio this week, discussing the recent Bid Protest Weekly
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, October 4, 2013, 11:02am EST GAO Is Closed For Business According to the GAO website, GAO is among the slew of federal agencies to cease operations during the government shutdown. This will obviously have a significant impact on bid protests, both on
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Wednesday, September 27, 2013, 11:42am EST Gulf Master General Trading, LLC, B-407941.2, July 15, 2013 A decision recently released by GAO provides a good illustration of the dangers to contractors in offering unbalanced pricing in proposals submitted on government contracts. “Unbalanced pricing” exists where
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Friday, September 20, 2013, 4:07pm EST Alliance Worldwide Distributing, LLC, B-408491, September 12, 2013 Some studies have shown that the English language has over one million different words, so it is difficult to imagine that there are limits to the number of descriptive terms
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Wednesday, September 11, 2013, 10:29am EST Sentrillion Corporation, B-406843.3, B-406843.4, B-406843.5, April 22, 2013 It is a fundamental principle of negotiated procurements that when an agency conducts discussions with offerors, those discussions must be meaningful. In a previous Bid Protest Weekly article, we discussed
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Wednesday, September 5, 2013, 7:00pm EST J. Squared Inc., d/b/a University Loft Company, B-408388, August 27, 2013 Earlier this year, we discussed a case in which GAO held that agencies must have adequate justification in order to maintain loyalty to one particular brand. There,
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Thursday, August 29, 2013, 4:00pm EST Coulson Aviation (USA) Inc.; 10 Tanker Air Carrier, LLC—Costs, B-406920.6, B-406920.7, August 22, 2013 There are several benefits that an unsuccessful offeror may achieve by virtue of filing a bid protest. The most obvious is a determination that
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Wednesday, August 21, 2013, 6:55pm EST ST Net, Inc. v. United States, No. 13-223C, August 13, 2013 Albert Einstein is quoted as saying “anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.” Well that’s a nice sentiment, but for contractors
Bid Protest Weekly Newsletter by Bryan R. King, Attorney, General Counsel PC Date: Wednesday, August 14, 2013,5:19pm EST Vinculum Solutions, Inc., B-408337; B-408337.2, August 5, 2013 A few months ago, we discussed a GAO decision in which a solicitation was canceled due to a lack of funding. While that case was not related to the recent budget