Protest Denial Decision: $38M IRS Enterprise Services, Solution Engineering, Data Engineering support BPA

GAO Case: B-421944.2

Digest

Protest challenging the agency’s evaluation of quotations and resulting best-value tradeoff is denied where the evaluation, and the tradeoff selection of a higher-rated, higher-priced quotation, were reasonable and consistent with the solicitation.

Discussion

Allicent raises numerous challenges to the agency’s evaluation of quotations and the resulting source selection decision. In this regard, the protester argues that the agency unreasonably assessed weaknesses in Allicent’s quotation under the technical approach factor, that the agency’s assignment of adjectival ratings under the non-price factors was unreasonable, and that the resulting best‑value tradeoff was unreasonable and undocumented. Although we do not specifically address all of Allicent’s challenges, we have considered each of them fully and find that none affords a basis on which to sustain the protest.

The protester challenges the assessment of several weaknesses in its quotation under the technical approach factor. Protest at 11‑15; Comments at 3‑11. As discussed below in a few representative examples, we find that the agency’s assessment of weaknesses under the technical approach factor was reasonable and consistent with the RFQ’s evaluation criteria.

When, as here, an agency issues a solicitation to FSS contract holders under FAR subpart 8.4 and conducts a competition, we will review the record to ensure that the agency’s evaluation was reasonable and consistent with the terms of the solicitation. EA Eng’g, Sci., and Tech., Inc., B‑417361, B‑417361.2, June 13, 2019, 2019 CPD ¶ 218 at 3. It is a vendor’s responsibility to submit a well-written …

Decision

Allicent Technology, LLC, a small business of McLean, Virginia, protests the establishment of a blanket purchase agreement (BPA) with Golden IT, LLC, a small business of Olathe, Kansas, under request for quotations (RFQ) No. 8296, issued by the Department of the Treasury, Internal Revenue Service (IRS), for information technology (IT) engineering services in support of the IRS’s solution engineering program. Allicent challenges the agency’s evaluation of quotations and resulting best-value tradeoff.

We deny the protest.

Read the decision here.

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Protest Denied: $38M IRS Enterprise Services, Solution Engineering, Data Engineering support BPA

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