FC Construction Company, Inc., B-287059, April 10, 2001

B-287059 Apr 10, 2001 Jump To VIEW DECISION RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights Protester's challenge to the agency's assessment of past and present performance is denied where the record shows that the agency evaluation was reasonable. That offerors were treated equally. Protester's assertion that the agency wrongly transcribed the telephonic responses of commercial references identified by the protester's subcontractor is denied where the commercial references apparently declined to make themselves available for a hearing that would permit assessment of the relative credibility of witnesses whose version of the same event is in conflict. BACKGROUND This RFP for custodial services was issued on June 29. The RFP also advised that award would be made to the offeror whose proposal is considered most advantageous to the government after evaluating performance and price. View Decision Matter of: FC Construction Company, Inc. File: B-287059 Date: April 10, 2001 DIGEST Attorneys DECISION FC Construction Company, Inc. protests the award of a contract to TRECO Services, Inc. pursuant to request for proposals (RFP) No. 41614-00-R0003, issued by the Department of the Air Force for base custodial services at Goodfellow Air Force Base (AFB), San Angelo, Texas. FC argues that the Air Force improperly evaluated its past performance, and that of the awardee, TRECO, leading the contracting officer to wrongly conclude that TRECO's higher-priced proposal offered the greatest value to the government. We deny the protest. BACKGROUND This RFP for custodial services was issued on June 29, 2000, and restricted the competition to minority-owned small businesses participating in the Small Business Administration's (SBA) section 8(a) program, and registered as 8(a) businesses with the SBA's district office in San Antonio, Texas. RFP at 1. The RFP anticipated award of a fixed-price contract for a 1-year base period followed by up to four 1-year options. Id. at 2. The RFP also advised that award would be made to the offeror whose proposal is considered most advantageous to the government after evaluating performance and price; the two evaluation factors were approximately equal in weight. Id. amend. 0003, at 9b. Potential offerors were advised that the agency would rank proposals by price, evaluate the performance of the offerors submitting the lowest-priced proposals, and perform a limited price evaluation. Id. at 9b. The RFP also advised that the agency's review of each offeror's past and present performance would be conducted using written questionnaires and would lead to an assessment of performance risk as either "exceptional," "very good," "satisfactory," "none," "marginal," or "unsatisfactory." The rating of "none" was reserved for offerors with no relevant past or present performance history, and was to be "treated neither favorably nor unfavorably." Id. In addition to setting forth the evaluation process, the RFP also advised potential offerors of certain award preferences based on the evaluation information generated. Id. at 9b-9c. In this regard, the RFP directed that if the offeror with the lowest-priced proposal received a performance risk rating of exceptional, award would "be made to that offeror without further consideration of any other offers." Id. at 9b. In addition, the RFP reserved for the agency the right to award to other than the offeror with the lowest-priced proposal "if that offeror is judged to have a performance risk rating of `very good' or higher." Id. at 9c. In this event, however, the RFP required that the contracting officer "make an integrated assessment best value award decision." Id. The Air Force initially received five proposals in response to this solicitation. As indicated above, the proposals were ranked by price, with FC submitting the lowest-priced proposal ($2.4 million). Contracting Officer's (CO) Statement at 2; Price Competition Memorandum at 1. For reasons not relevant here, the second and fourth lowest-priced proposals were removed from the competition, and were not evaluated. Thus, TRECO was ultimately the offeror with the second lowest-price ($2.7 million), while a third offeror proposed the highest price ([deleted]). Id. After completing the first of two price evaluations, neither of which is relevant to this dispute, the agency turned to its review of performance. FC's proposal did not initially include references or any other information for the agency to review for its evaluation of performance. Thus, the agency contacted the owner of FC, who provided a list of references to the agency by facsimile transmission. Upon receiving the list, the agency noted that the list was headed by the name of a different company, American Building Maintenance Co. (ABM).