Coffman Specialties, Inc., B-284546; B-284546.2, May 10, 2000

Coffman Specialties, Inc., B-284546; B-284546.2, May 10, 2000 TITLE: Coffman Specialties, Inc., B-284546; B-284546.2, May 10, 2000 BNUMBER: B-284546; B-284546.2 DATE: May 10, 2000 ********************************************************************** Coffman Specialties, Inc., B-284546; B-284546.2, May 10, 2000 Decision Matter of: Coffman Specialties, Inc. File: B-284546; B-284546.2 Date: May 10, 2000 Kerri M. Melucci, Esq., Braun, Melucci & Bright, for the protester. Michael L. Murphy, Jr., Esq., Sylvester Law Office, for Dar-Hil Corporation, an intervenor. Daniel J. Dykstra, Jr., Esq., and William L. Henson, Esq., U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, for the agency. Cheri C. Wolff, Esq., and Kenneth W. Dodds, Esq., Small Business Administration. Christine F. Davis, Esq., and James Spangenberg, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST 1. Agency reasonably downgraded proposal that failed to comply with solicitation's formatting requirements, including limits on the number of pages and projects to address particular evaluation subfactors. 2. Where proposal, on its face, does not reasonably lead the agency to conclude that the offeror will not comply with the subcontracting limitation contained in the solicitation, the offeror's compliance concerns a matter of responsibility or contract administration, not for review by the General Accounting Office. DECISION Coffman Specialties, Inc. protests the award of a contract to Dar-Hil Corporation under request for proposals (RFP) No. DACA05-99-R-0059, issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, for the design and construction of an aircraft processing ramp at the Davis Monthan Air Force Base, Arizona. Coffman protests the evaluation of its own and the awardee's proposals, and contends that the awardee will exceed the subcontracting limitation included in the RFP. We deny the protest. The RFP, a small business set-aside, contemplated the award of a fixed-price contract based on initial proposals. RFP at Department of Defense Form 1707, 00100-12, 00100-13. The RFP established a price/technical tradeoff award basis, giving approximately equal weight to price and technical proposals. Id. at 00100-19. The following technical evaluation factors and subfactors were listed: Factor 1: Past Performance [factor has no subfactors] Factor 2: Experience Subfactor 2A: Design Subfactor 2B: Construction Subfactor 2C: Organization/Project Team Factor 3: Management Approach Subfactor 3A: Key Personnel Subfactor 3B: Quality Control Subfactor 3C: Project Management Approach RFP amend. 2, at 00100-18. The RFP requested specific information under each evaluation factor and subfactor, and included format limitations that prescribed the manner in which the offeror was to present the information. Among other format limitations, each factor and subfactor limited the number of pages and/or the number of projects that the offeror could submit for evaluation purposes. RFP, as amended, at 00100-23 to 00100-28. The RFP warned that the limits prescribed for specific submissions will be strictly adhered to and enforced. Information submitted which exceeds the specified limit will not be evaluated. (For example, if an offeror were to submit three pages in response to an item with a two page limitation, the information on the first and second pages would be evaluated but the information on the third page would not.) RFP at 00100-22. The RFP also directed offerors to locate information under the appropriate evaluation factor or subfactor and warned that failure to do so might result in a lower technical score if evaluators could not readily locate the appropriate information. Id. Six firms, including Coffman and Dar-Hil, submitted proposals. Finding all proposals acceptable, the agency elected to make an initial proposal award. The protester's proposal was the lowest-priced at $3,865,000, Offeror A's proposal was the next lowest-priced at $4,044,800, and Dar-Hil's proposal was the third lowest-priced at $4,666,311. In terms of technical merit, Dar-Hil's proposal was the highest-rated, earning 91.5 out of 100 available evaluation points; Offeror A's proposal was the next highest-rated, earning 81.4 evaluation points; and Coffman's proposal was the fifth highest-rated, earning 74.3 evaluation points. Agency Report, Tab 3, Business Clearance Memorandum, at 4-5. A major reason that Coffman's proposal was rated so low was its failure to follow the RFP formatting requirements, including the various maximum project and page limitations. Agency Report, Tab 4, Source Selection Information, para. 5.e. Considering the results of the price and technical evaluations, the Corps determined that only Dar-Hil's and Offeror A's proposals were in contention for award.