Metropolitan Interpreters & Translators, B-285394.2; B-285394.3; B-285394.4, December 1, 2000

Metropolitan Interpreters & Translators, B-285394.2; B-285394.3; B-285394.4, December 1, 2000 TITLE: Metropolitan Interpreters & Translators, B-285394.2; B-285394.3; B-285394.4, December 1, 2000 BNUMBER: B-285394.2; B-285394.3; B-285394.4 DATE: December 1, 2000 ********************************************************************** Metropolitan Interpreters & Translators, B-285394.2; B-285394.3; B-285394.4, December 1, 2000 Decision Matter of: Metropolitan Interpreters & Translators File: B-285394.2; B-285394.3; B-285394.4 Date: December 1, 2000 Patrick K. O'keefe, Esq., and Thomas F. Burke, Esq., McKenna & Cuneo, for the protester. Pamela J. Mazza, Esq., and Philip M. Dearborn III, Esq., Piliero, Mazza & Pargament, for Comprehensive Technologies International, Inc., an intervenor. J. Michael Sawyers, Esq., Drug Enforcement Administration, 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 Protest of award of contract for linguist services is denied where agency reasonably determined technical advantages of the awardee's proposal were worth its higher price; awardee's proposal was evaluated superior to protester's under the second and third most important technical evaluation factors, both proposals were evaluated acceptable under most important factor, and technical considerations were substantially more important than price. DECISION Metropolitan Interpreters & Translators protests the Drug Enforcement Administration's (DEA) award of a contract to Comprehensive Technologies International, Inc. (CTI) under request for proposals (RFP) No. DEA-99-R-0004, for linguist services for DEA's New York Field Division (NYFD). Metropolitan primarily challenges the technical evaluation. We deny the protest. The RFP anticipated the award of a fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity labor-hour contract, for a base year with 4 option years, for linguist services--including monitoring, transcribing and interpreting--and automated data processing (ADP) services in support of judicially authorized communications intercepts. Although the majority of the linguist work required is for translating Spanish to English, the contractor is required to furnish upon request linguists knowledgeable and proficient in 42 specified languages and dialects, as well as in numerous other generally described languages (e.g., "[a]ll other Eastern European," "[a]ll other Western/European," and "[a]ll other Asian"). RFP, Statement of Work (SOW), sect. C.10. The RFP specified a required core unit of 23 persons--a project manager, 10 linguists, 2 linguist supervisors, a clerical assistant, 2 computer data librarians, an ADP task manager, 2 communications specialists, 2 computer programmers, a senior data technician, and a systems analyst--for whom offerors were to furnish resumes and letters of commitment. SOW sect.sect. C.2, C.11; RFP sect. L.6-3, at L-20. However, while the minimum workload under the contract required only 12 core linguists and linguist supervisors, the maximum workload under the contract required 205 linguists and linguist supervisors. RFP sect. B.9. Award was to be made to the responsible offeror whose conforming proposal represented the best value, and was most advantageous to the government. RFP sect. M.2(A). The RFP provided for proposals to be evaluated based on the following seven enumerated evaluation factors: (1) offeror's ability to furnish qualified personnel to perform the required services, including consideration of the quality and qualifications of the proposed core personnel, the offeror's ability to furnish additional personnel beyond the core personnel, and whether the offeror has demonstrated "by reasoning or evidence that the hiring/selection and retention policies/procedures are adequate to support successful performance"; (2) quality control plan; (3) management plan and ability to manage all aspects of the contract, including corporate commitment, hiring, retaining and training employees, scheduling, security issues, reporting requirements, performance risk, schedule risk, and cost risk; (4) security plan; (5) past performance/risk assessment, under which the agency was to consider the offeror's previous work experience in similar or related work, performance improvements, and completed past performance surveys and ratings; (6) compliance with the RFP instructions; and (7) cost/price. RFP sect. M.5. The RFP stated that the seven factors, as set forth above, were "listed in equal or descending order of importance," RFP sect. M.5, but it also added that the "technical factors . . . are in descending order of importance," and that the "combination of all technical factors is substantially more important than the cost/price." RFP sect. M.2. Six proposals were received in response to the RFP; only Metropolitan's and CTI's were included in the competitive range.