McRae Industries, Inc., B-287609.2, July 20, 2001

B-287609.2 Jul 20, 2001 Jump To VIEW DECISION RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights Protester is an interested party to challenge contracting agency's alleged waiver of solicitation testing requirements notwithstanding that it did not submit a proposal where. If protest were sustained. The protester would have an opportunity to compete under a revised solicitation. 2. Allegation that in connection with a procurement for boots agency improperly waived solicitation's strict sample test requirements is denied where the agency reasonably determined that all offerors' samples would have passed the omitted tests. The end items will be subjected to the solicitation's strict field performance requirements. The protester was not prejudiced by the agency's actions. Offerors were required to submit several pairs of PDMs for testing in accordance with PD 99-09. View Decision McRae Industries, Inc., B-287609.2, July 20, 2001 DIGEST Attorneys DECISION McRae Industries, Inc. protests the award of contracts to Belleville Shoe Manufacturing Company and Wolverine World Wide, Inc. under request for proposals (RFP) No. SPO100-00-R-0050, issued by the Defense Supply Center Philadelphia (DSCP) for intermediate cold/wet boots with removable insulated booties. McRae, who did not submit a proposal, contends that DSCP improperly waived required tests of the boots. We deny the protest. BACKGROUND The RFP, issued as a partial set-aside for small businesses, contemplated the award of two indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contracts for a base period with up to four 1-year option periods. Section C of the RFP required that the boots be manufactured in accordance with Purchase Description CRFD/PD 99-09 (Apr. 19, 2000) (PD 99-09). The RFP listed several technical evaluation factors including, as relevant here, product demonstration models (PDM). In this connection, offerors were required to submit several pairs of PDMs for testing in accordance with PD 99-09. The RFP contemplated that the agency would subject the PDMs to three end-item tests on a pass/fail basis for leakage, bond strength, and toe adhesion. If a PDM failed any of these three tests, that offer would be eliminated from the competition. The agency states that since it did not own the required leakage testing equipment, it purchased a machine from the Satra Technology Center, the only known commercial manufacturer of this equipment. During a practice run on the newly-acquired equipment, the Satra machine stopped functioning after only a few cycles. The agency states, however, that all offerors proposed PDMs constructed with a Gore-Tex membrane, a material which the contracting officer (CO) states has historically been found to effectively provide waterproof protection. In addition, the CO states that contractors that have used Gore-Tex in their boots have successfully performed on similar DSCP contracts. In view of DSCP's inability to perform the Satra leakage test, and given that Gore-Tex has proven effective in preventing water infiltration in the past, the CO determined "with a high degree of certainty" that all PDMs submitted would have passed the test, would meet the PD 99-09 requirements, and would satisfy the agency's field use performance standards. Agency Report (AR) exh. 6, CO's Memorandum to DSCP-CRFA, Dec. 7, 2000, at 1. After considering several alternatives, the agency decided the PDM leakage test was not needed. At about the same time that the Satra machine stopped functioning properly, the CO learned that the agency could not perform the toe adhesion test because a separate machine needed for this test was inoperable and not scheduled for repairs, and DSCP did not have access to the equipment necessary to perform this test. In this connection, DSCP states that the toe adhesion test was developed to augment the bond strength test and that when it prepared the RFP, it believed that this test would be performed using government-owned equipment. The record indicates that historically, there have been no failures of this test. According to the CO, since the requirements for passing the toe adhesion test are less strict than the bond strength test, and since all PDMs tested passed the more rigorous bond strength test, the CO concluded that the toe adhesion test was not necessary. Based on the evaluations of proposals under the other factors, including price, the CO determined that Wolverine's and Belleville's proposals offered the best value and awarded contracts to those two firms on April 12, 2001. The protester maintains that DSCP improperly waived the RFP's test requirements for leakage and toe adhesion without informing potential offerors of the waiver. Although McRae did not submit a proposal, McRae contends that it was prejudiced by the agency's action because it "would have submitted a proposal, but for the requirement to produce boots that could pass the restrictive tests required by the Specification." Protest at 8.