August 23, 2016
Before a contractor offers more than the solicitation requires, it should first confirm that it will receive credit for going above and beyond. This is particularly true where the solicitation lays out a clear evaluation scheme and identifies certain evaluation factors as threshold criteria rather than factors to be rated comparatively, with more credit given for exceeding requirements. As the…
August 8, 2016
As government contractors gain experience and develop their skills, they often reap the hoped-for reward: more contracts. But when success comes in the form of future awards, contractors (and the agencies with which they consistently do business) must always be on the lookout for potential organizational conflicts of interest (OCI). Determining whether an OCI exists can be a tricky endeavor, as…
August 1, 2016
The FAR Council recently issued a final rule amending five standard forms prescribed by the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) for contracts involving bonds and other financial protections. The revisions are aimed at expanding the options for organization types and clarifying liability limitations.
More particularly, the new rule addresses the concerns by surety bond producers that they may be…
August 1, 2016
After an unsuccessful bid, disappointed bidders sometimes present hyper-technical protests in a passionate, yet misplaced, attempt to protect their economic interests. Many of these protests ignore the wide discretion GAO gives to agencies in their evaluation pf proposals, and ultimate selection of an awardee. Bidders on Architecture and Engineering (A&E) contracts must be particularly aware that…
June 12, 2016
A recent decision by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) illustrates the importance of properly meeting a solicitation’s requirements in full, to include page limits and font sizes. While these may seem like insignificant details, failure to follow the instructions to the letter can mean the difference between a proposal being evaluated on its technical merits and being eliminated from…
May 23, 2016
A protest sustained on its merits is always good news for a contractor, and often is accompanied by an award of the costs to pursue the protest. Occasionally, however, a contractor will achieve an even bigger win: not only seeing its protest sustained and recouping its protest costs, but also winning award of its proposal preparation costs. The recent Government Accountability…
May 15, 2016
In a negotiated procurement, it is axiomatic that, when discussions are initiated, an agency must hold “meaningful discussions” with all offerors. On the other hand, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) has held time and again that an agency need not “spoon-feed” an offeror by identifying every area in which an offer could be improved. In Crowley Logistics, Inc., the GAO addressed the…
March 6, 2016
At the March 14th Meeting of the Northern West Virginia Chapter of the National Contract Management Association (NCMA), Eric Whytsell will be giving a presentation entitled, “Practical Answers to Key Protest Questions.” His talk will address the complex set of questions surrounding bid protests, questions that any contractor that has ever been -- or thought it might become -- a disappointed…
February 29, 2016
Preparing a responsive proposal requires reading and understanding the solicitation requirements and then meeting them -- as clearly and unambiguously as possible. The most direct and least risky way to craft such a response is to adopt whatever method of compliance the solicitation suggests (or requires). But, as the recent decision in Penn Parking, Inc., B-412280.2 (February 17, 2016) makes…
February 22, 2016
One of the reasons it’s so important to read solicitations carefully is that such review can help you identify any ambiguities before submitting your proposal. If the ambiguity is obvious, or “patent”, you must protest it before the proposal due date or not at all. In other words, an offeror can’t wait to see who wins the contract before deciding to gripe about an ambiguity that may have hurt its…
February 15, 2016
When assessing opportunities and preparing proposals, reading and understanding the contents of the solicitation is imperative. If you don’t know what the solicitation requires, it can be very hard to prepare a responsive, much less winning, proposal. But focusing exclusively on the words themselves – separated from their proper context – can also lead offerors astray. This point was brought home…
February 3, 2016
“Prejudice is an element of every viable protest.” No matter how many times the Government Accountability Office (GAO) intones this phrase in its protest decisions (and it’s in many GAO decisions), the concept of prejudice and the need to prove it to win a protest remain all too easy to forget in the heat of “battle.” The GAO’s decision in Data Recognition Corporation, B-411767.7, (January 20,…
August 23, 2016
Before a contractor offers more than the solicitation requires, it should first confirm that it will receive credit for going above and beyond. This is particularly true where the solicitation lays out a clear evaluation scheme and identifies certain evaluation factors as threshold criteria rather than factors to be rated comparatively, with more credit given for exceeding requirements. As the…
August 8, 2016
As government contractors gain experience and develop their skills, they often reap the hoped-for reward: more contracts. But when success comes in the form of future awards, contractors (and the agencies with which they consistently do business) must always be on the lookout for potential organizational conflicts of interest (OCI). Determining whether an OCI exists can be a tricky endeavor, as…
August 1, 2016
The FAR Council recently issued a final rule amending five standard forms prescribed by the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) for contracts involving bonds and other financial protections. The revisions are aimed at expanding the options for organization types and clarifying liability limitations.
More particularly, the new rule addresses the concerns by surety bond producers that they may be…
August 1, 2016
After an unsuccessful bid, disappointed bidders sometimes present hyper-technical protests in a passionate, yet misplaced, attempt to protect their economic interests. Many of these protests ignore the wide discretion GAO gives to agencies in their evaluation pf proposals, and ultimate selection of an awardee. Bidders on Architecture and Engineering (A&E) contracts must be particularly aware that…
June 12, 2016
A recent decision by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) illustrates the importance of properly meeting a solicitation’s requirements in full, to include page limits and font sizes. While these may seem like insignificant details, failure to follow the instructions to the letter can mean the difference between a proposal being evaluated on its technical merits and being eliminated from…
May 23, 2016
A protest sustained on its merits is always good news for a contractor, and often is accompanied by an award of the costs to pursue the protest. Occasionally, however, a contractor will achieve an even bigger win: not only seeing its protest sustained and recouping its protest costs, but also winning award of its proposal preparation costs. The recent Government Accountability…
May 15, 2016
In a negotiated procurement, it is axiomatic that, when discussions are initiated, an agency must hold “meaningful discussions” with all offerors. On the other hand, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) has held time and again that an agency need not “spoon-feed” an offeror by identifying every area in which an offer could be improved. In Crowley Logistics, Inc., the GAO addressed the…
March 6, 2016
At the March 14th Meeting of the Northern West Virginia Chapter of the National Contract Management Association (NCMA), Eric Whytsell will be giving a presentation entitled, “Practical Answers to Key Protest Questions.” His talk will address the complex set of questions surrounding bid protests, questions that any contractor that has ever been -- or thought it might become -- a disappointed…
February 29, 2016
Preparing a responsive proposal requires reading and understanding the solicitation requirements and then meeting them -- as clearly and unambiguously as possible. The most direct and least risky way to craft such a response is to adopt whatever method of compliance the solicitation suggests (or requires). But, as the recent decision in Penn Parking, Inc., B-412280.2 (February 17, 2016) makes…
February 22, 2016
One of the reasons it’s so important to read solicitations carefully is that such review can help you identify any ambiguities before submitting your proposal. If the ambiguity is obvious, or “patent”, you must protest it before the proposal due date or not at all. In other words, an offeror can’t wait to see who wins the contract before deciding to gripe about an ambiguity that may have hurt its…
February 15, 2016
When assessing opportunities and preparing proposals, reading and understanding the contents of the solicitation is imperative. If you don’t know what the solicitation requires, it can be very hard to prepare a responsive, much less winning, proposal. But focusing exclusively on the words themselves – separated from their proper context – can also lead offerors astray. This point was brought home…
February 3, 2016
“Prejudice is an element of every viable protest.” No matter how many times the Government Accountability Office (GAO) intones this phrase in its protest decisions (and it’s in many GAO decisions), the concept of prejudice and the need to prove it to win a protest remain all too easy to forget in the heat of “battle.” The GAO’s decision in Data Recognition Corporation, B-411767.7, (January 20,…
