Dominion Aviation, Inc.--Reconsideration, B-275419.4,

B-275419.4 Feb 24, 1998 Jump To VIEW DECISION DOWNLOADS RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights A firm requested reconsideration of its denied protest of an Army contract award for rotary wing (helicopter) flight training services. GAO had held that the awardee's proposal offered the best value under the stated evaluation criteria. In its request for reconsideration, the protester contended that since the solicitation did not provide for consideration of anything other than past performance, it was improper for the Army to consider the protester's evaluated inadequate staffing in the determination of performance risk. GAO held that the protester's request for reconsideration was untimely, since information concerning the proposal evaluations was available at least 2 months earlier. Accordingly, the request for reconsideration was denied. View Decision Matter of: Dominion Aviation, Inc.--Reconsideration File: B-275419.4 Date: February 24, 1998 DIGEST Attorneys DECISION Dominion Aviation, Inc. requests that we reconsider our decision, Doss Aviation, Inc.; Dominion Aviation, Inc., B-275419 et al., Feb. 20, 1997, 97-1 CPD Para. 117, in which we denied its protest against the Department of the Army's award of a contract to UNC Aviation Services, under request for proposals No. DABT01-96-R-0001, for rotary wing (helicopter) flight training services at Fort Rucker. We deny the request. As noted in our decision, the Army determined that Dominion's proposal offered moderate performance risk as a result of inadequate staffing with respect to instructor pilots, a limited ability to absorb within its proposed contract price the likely cost increases it would encounter in performing the contract, and a marginal past performance record. In contrast, the agency determined that UNC had submitted a technically superior proposal which was based on adequate staffing with experienced personnel and offered advantages in a number of areas, including quality control and management, and that UNC had an excellent performance record as the incumbent contractor, demonstrating its ability to successfully and safely perform the required work at its stated fixed price, such that UNC's proposal overall offered the agency a significantly higher likelihood of the successful performance of vital, safety-related services. Given the evaluated superiority of UNC's proposal under the most important evaluation factor (technical), its excellent performance record as the incumbent contractor, the greater realism of its proposed cost/price, the fact that price was the least important of four evaluation factors, and the fact that UNC's price was only 5.1 percent higher than Dominion's price, we found no basis to question the agency's position that UNC's proposal offered the best value under the stated evaluation criteria. In its request for reconsideration, Dominion challenges the Army's evaluation that its proposal offered moderate performance risk. As an initial matter, Dominion notes that the solicitation provided for the government to "conduct a performance risk assessment based on the offeror's present and past performance as it relates to the probability of successfully accomplishing the proposed effort." According to the protester, since this provision did not provide for consideration of anything other than past performance, it was improper for the agency to consider Dominion's evaluated inadequate staffing in the determination of performance risk. Dominion's position ignores the fact that Dominion's overall moderate risk rating was based on both a proposal risk assessment, which found that Dominion's inadequate staffing and limited ability to absorb within its proposed contract price likely cost increases warranted a moderate performance risk assessment, and a separate past performance risk assessment, which found that Dominion's performance history warranted a moderate risk assessment. Specifically, the source selection evaluation board (SSEB) reported that on the only prior contract on which the agency had received reports with respect to the performance of Dominion itself (rather than its employees), which was one of only two government contracts on which Dominion, a newly formed company, was performing, Dominion had encountered significant performance problems; although contracting officials were advised by the assigned Defense Contract Management Center that Dominion's performance on this contract had improved such that it was now marginal, but satisfactory, the SSEB concluded that this level of past performance itself created a moderate risk.