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The following is an installment in Crowell & Moring’s Bid Protest Sustain of the Month Series.  In this series, Crowell’s Government Contracts Practice will keep you up to date with a summary of one of the most notable bid protest sustain decisions each month.  Below, Crowell Consultant (and former GAO Bid Protest Hearing Officer) Cherie Owen discusses several protest decisions issued in May that provide helpful insights about the GAO protest process.Continue Reading May 2025 Bid Protest Sustain of the Month: In a Sustain-less Month, a Look Back at May’s Digested Dismissal Decisions

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A string of GAO protest sustains this spring, most recently in Owl International Inc., d/b/a Global, a 1st Flagship Company, B-423281, B-423281.2, April 25, 2025, demonstrates that the evaluation of professional employee compensation remains a successful post-award protest argument. Continue Reading Recent GAO Decisions Show Professional Employee Compensation Challenges Remain a Successful Protest Argument

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For the first time in nearly a decade, GAO in Knudsen Systems, Inc. sustained a protest challenging an agency’s decision to set aside a procurement for small businesses.  The decision involves the so-called “Rule of Two”:  under FAR 19.502-2(b), agencies must set aside for small businesses a procurement with an anticipated dollar value of more than $150,000 where the agency’s market research demonstrates there is a reasonable expectation at least two responsible small business offerors can meet the agency’s requirements at a fair market price.Continue Reading “Et ‘two,’ GAO?”:Recent Sustain on the Rule of Two Reminds Agencies of the Importance of Accurate Market Research

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Most organizational conflict of interest (OCI) sustains arise where the record shows that an agency failed to analyze the potential for a conflict.  But GAO’s decision in A Square Group, LLC, is a rarer type of OCI sustain: the agency considered the purported OCI and documented its conclusion that the OCI had been mitigated.  However, GAO found that the agency’s conclusions were unreasonable, and the OCI risk remained.Continue Reading Agency Said Awardee Fully Mitigated OCI; GAO Says: “Nope!”

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Procurement Integrity Act, Federal Bribery Law

This week’s episode covers a GAO protest regarding the Procurement Integrity Act and a U.S. Supreme Court decision narrowing the scope of federal bribery law, and is hosted by Peter Eyre. Crowell & Moring’s “Fastest 5 Minutes” is a biweekly podcast that provides a brief summary of significant government…

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Offerors understand that missing a submission deadline can sink even the best proposal because “late is late.”  But what happens when an offeror timely emails its proposal only to have an agency server reject it without any notification to the offeror?  GAO’s recent decision in Guidehouse, Inc., B-422115.2, Jan. 19, 2024, says that the proposal is still late and emphasizes the potentially draconian impact of the “late is late” rule.Continue Reading The Agency’s Email Server Ate My Proposal! – GAO Rejects Challenge to “Late is Late” Rule

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In its first published bid protest sustain decision of the new year, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) highlights agencies’ obligation to adequately document a substantive analysis of proposals against the solicitation requirements, even in FAR Part 16.5 procurements.  In SierTeK-Peerless JV LLC, B-422085, B-422085.2, Jan. 2, 2024, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) conducted a task order competition for property management support services among OASIS 8(a) pool 1 contract holders.  The solicitation required TSA to assess the size and scope of offerors’ prior experience as compared to the solicited task order requirements.  SierTeK-Peerless, the unsuccessful offeror, challenged TSA’s award to Strativia, arguing in a supplemental protest that the agency’s evaluation of the awardee’s prior experience was flawed because TSA failed to reasonably assess the similarity of Strativia’s prior experience. Continue Reading GAO’s First Sustain of 2024 Emphasizes the Need for Documented Analysis of Offerors’ Proposals Against Solicitation Requirements

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Subject to limited exceptions, GAO’s bid protest jurisdiction over Department of Defense (DoD) awards of task orders under multiple-award contracts is limited to those “valued in excess” of $25 million.  While that seems straightforward enough, GAO’s recent decision in ELS, Inc., B 421989, B 421989.2, Dec. 21, 2023, highlights the complexities that can arise in calculating a task order’s value.Continue Reading When Determining Task Order Value for GAO Protest Jurisdiction, Look to What the Task Order Says, Not What the Agency May Do 

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On October 26, 2023, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) released its Annual Report on Bid Protests for Fiscal Year 2023.

The total number of protests filed and the number of protests sustained by GAO increased significantly compared to Fiscal Year 2022—and GAO’s “Sustain Rate” jumped to 31%.  GAO downplayed these increases to a degree, highlighting that it received “an unusually high number of protests challenging a single procurement”—the Department of Health and Human Services’ award of Chief Information Officer-Solutions and Partners 4 (CIO-SP4) government-wide acquisition contracts—which resulted in over 100 sustained protests.  Nonetheless, even excluding the CIO-SP4 protests, it appears that GAO’s “Effectiveness Rate” (the percentage of cases in which the protester received relief, such as voluntary corrective action or a GAO sustain) was comparable to prior years—at or near 50%.  Thus, bid protests remain an important oversight mechanism for the federal procurement system.Continue Reading GAO’s Bid Protest Sustain Rate Soars, but Is There a Catch?

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The following is an installment in Crowell & Moring’s 2023 Bid Protest Sustain of the Month Series.  All through 2023, Crowell’s Government Contracts Practice will keep you up to date with a summary of the most notable bid protest sustain decision each month.  Below, Crowell Partner Cherie Owen discusses GAO’s decision in Mandex, Inc., involving organizational conflicts of interest (OCIs).Continue Reading August 2023 Bid Protest Sustain of the Month