Physician Corporation of America

Physician Corporation of America BNUMBER: B-270698; B-270698.4; B-270698.5; B-270698.7 DATE: April 10, 1996 TITLE: Physician Corporation of America ********************************************************************** DOCUMENT FOR PUBLIC RELEASE A protected decision was issued on the date below and was subject to a GAO Protective Order. This version has been redacted or approved by the parties involved for public release. Matter of:Physician Corporation of America File: B-270698; B-270698.4; B-270698.5; B-270698.7 Date:April 10, 1996 David R. Hazelton, Esq., Roger S. Goldman, Esq., C. Chad Johnson, Esq., and Robert Braumuller, Esq., Latham & Watkins, for the protester. Peter L. Wellington, Esq., Daniel C. Sauls, Esq., and Mark J. Hulkower, Esq., Steptoe & Johnson, for Humana Military Healthcare Services, Inc., an intervenor. Ellen C. Callaway, Esq., and Laurel C. Gillespie, Esq., Office of the Civilian Health and Medical Program of the Uniformed Services, for the agency. David A. Ashen, Esq., and John M. Melody, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST 1. In determining whether any action of a former government employee may have resulted in prejudice in favor of the awardee, the General Accounting Office will consider all relevant evidence, including whether the former government employee had access to competitively useful inside information generated prior to the protested procurement. 2. Protest that awardee obtained an unfair competitive advantage by virtue of its employment of former government employees is denied where either the government employees did not possess inside information that would provide an unfair competitive advantage or the record provides no basis for concluding that the awardee benefited from the inside information. 3. Protest that awardee obtained an unfair competitive advantage from its alleged receipt of source selection sensitive information from a government employee is denied where the contracting officer furnished the information to all offerors. 4. Protest that offeror's proposal should have been credited with more technical strengths and fewer weaknesses because its allegedly similar proposal in a prior procurement for the same type of services was credited with more strengths and fewer weaknesses is denied; each procurement action is a separate transaction and, thus, the evaluation conducted under one is not relevant to the propriety of the evaluation under another for purposes of a bid protest. DECISION Physician Corporation of America (PCA) protests the award of a contract by the Office of Civilian Health and Medical Program of the Uniformed Services (OCHAMPUS) to Humana Military Healthcare Services, Inc. under request for proposals (RFP) No. MDA906-94-R-0002. The RFP sought proposals to provide health care and associated administrative services in the states of Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Tennessee, and in portions of Louisiana and Arkansas (Managed Care Support Regions 3 and 4) for Civilian Health and Medical Program of the Uniformed Services (CHAMPUS) beneficiaries, who include military service retirees, their dependents, and dependents of active duty members. PCA primarily argues that Humana obtained an unfair competitive advantage in the procurement by virtue of its employment of former government employees and its alleged receipt of source selection sensitive information from another government employee. In addition, PCA challenges the evaluation of technical proposals and asserts that Humana's proposal failed to comply with mandatory solicitation requirements. We deny the protests. BACKGROUND Under the RFP, issued on August 1, 1994, offerors were required to propose three health care options--the TRICARE options--for CHAMPUS beneficiaries. Specifically, the RFP required offerors to propose a health care system under which CHAMPUS beneficiaries could opt to obtain services: (1) from providers of their own choosing on a fee-for-service basis, (2) from members of the contractor's preferred provider organization (PPO), or (3) from a contractor-established health maintenance organization (HMO). The RFP stated that the government intended to award a fixed-price contract (with the price subject to specified adjustments during performance) for a base period with five 1-year options. The fixed-price nature of the contract, however, was modified by a risk-sharing arrangement under which, in the event of health care cost overruns, the government and the contractor will share responsibility for absorbing the excess cost above a set percentage of the contract price.