Dube Travel Agency & Tours, Inc.; Garber Travel

Dube Travel Agency & Tours, Inc.; Garber Travel BNUMBER: B-270438; B-270438.2 DATE: March 6, 1996 TITLE: Dube Travel Agency & Tours, Inc.; Garber Travel ********************************************************************** Matter of:Dube Travel Agency & Tours, Inc.; Garber Travel File: B-270438; B-270438.2 Date:March 6, 1996 Paul P. Murphy, Esq., Murphy & Coyne, for Dube Travel Agency & Tours, Inc.; Peter R. Chiesa, Esq., Wadleigh, Starr, Peters, Dunn and Chiesa, for Garber Travel. Judith A. Bonner, Esq., General Services Administration, for the agency. Katherine I. Riback, Esq., and Glenn G. Wolcott, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision DIGEST 1. Agency properly awarded contract to out-of-state firm where it was clearly stated that offerors would not be required to maintain an office in each state serviced and the awardee's proposal provided that it would establish an office in one of the states to be serviced. 2. Agency reasonably decided to reopen discussions and request a second round of best and final offers where it failed to advise a competitive range offeror during the first round of discussions of a deficiency in its proposal that rendered it unacceptable. 3. Agency's mathematical errors in the evaluation of the prior service evaluation factor do not provide a basis to sustain protests where, upon correction of the errors, it is clear that the protesters were not prejudiced. DECISION Dube Travel Agency & Tours, Inc. and Garber Travel protest the General Services Administration's (GSA) award of a contract to Travel Centre for the establishment and operation of a travel management center for the states of Maine and New Hampshire under request for proposals (RFP) No. 3FBG-W-AO-N-5199. Dube and Garber assert that Travel Centre's proposal should have been rejected because Travel Centre is an out-of-state firm, that the agency failed to engage in meaningful discussions, that the agency improperly conducted a second round of discussions and request for best and final offers (BAFOs), that Travel Centre will be unable to comply with the solicitation requirements, and that the agency erred in evaluating the offerors' prior service. We deny the protests. BACKGROUND On March 30, 1995, GSA announced its intention to conduct this procurement by publishing a notice in the Commerce Business Daily (CBD), stating: "This procurement is for Travel Management Center (travel agency) services for three States: Maine, Vermont and New Hampshire. . . . Responsible offerors will be located in and service the Federal agencies from one of these States. One, two or three contracts may result from the award of this solicitation. In other words, an offeror in Maine may receive a contract to service New Hampshire and Vermont, and an offeror in Vermont may receive a contract to service Maine (in this scenario, two contracts are awarded)." On April 21, the agency issued the RFP as a total small business set-aside. Consistent with the CBD notice, the RFP provided that the agency was seeking proposals for the establishment and operation of a travel management center for the states of Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont, and advised offerors that "this solicitation may result in one (1), two (2), or three (3) award(s)."[1] The solicitation further stated that "the offeror must be located in, or be willing to physically relocate to, a servicing office in the geographic area to be serviced." Regarding evaluation of proposals, section M of the RFP established three evaluation factors: basic requirements,[2] prior service,[3] and enhancements. The RFP provided that basic requirements would be evaluated on a pass/fail basis, that prior service and enhancements would be weighted equally, and that award(s) would be made on the basis of the proposal that met all the basic requirements and received the highest combined rating for prior service and enhancements. Regarding the evaluation of prior service, section M provided that the offerors' customers would be queried with regard to the offerors' "telephone response time, timeliness of ticket delivery, knowledge and courtesy of personnel, responsiveness in resolving problems, and overall quality of service." Sections C and L of the RFP established three categories of possible enhancements: (1) those which provide a cost savings to the government (for example free or reduced fee surface transportation to or from ports of debarkation/embarkation, free or reduced fee parking at ports of debarkation/embarkation, and free passport photos); (2) those which provide additional benefits or services to travelers and/or the government (for example, free flight insurance, free passport/visa service, or free baggage tracking service); and (3) additional rebate beyond that required.