Delco Industrial Textile Corporation, B-292324, August 8, 2003

B-292324 Aug 08, 2003 Jump To VIEW DECISION RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights DIGEST Protester's assertion that its subcontractor bore responsibility for untimely delivery under its prime contracts with the agency presents no basis for questioning the agency's downgrading of protester's proposal based on conclusion that its delivery record under those contracts was poor. Agency's evaluation properly was based on its reasonable perception of prior performance problems and. A prime contractor under a government contract is generally responsible for the performance of its subcontractors. Delco contends that the award decision was unreasonable. The ABVS score is comprised of a Federal Supply Class (FSC) score. Was determined to be the "best value" to the government based on past performance. View Decision Delco Industrial Textile Corporation, B-292324, August 8, 2003 DIGEST Attorneys DECISION Delco Industrial Textile Corporation protests the award of a contract to Weckworth Manufacturing, Inc. d/b/a Weckworth-Langdon under request for proposals (RFP) No. SP0560-02-R-0376, issued by the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA), Defense Supply Center Philadelphia (DSCP), for sling cargo nets. Delco contends that the award decision was unreasonable. We deny the protest. The RFP, issued July 3, 2002 as a small business set-aside, anticipated the award of a fixed-price contract for quantities of nylon, sling cargo nets, for use in moving cargo from ship to ship by helicopter. The RFP instructed offerors to provide a list of prior contracts performed, along with references. The solicitation also advised offerors that past performance would be evaluated using DLA's Automated Best Value System (ABVS), which assigns firms a numeric score based on their performance history, including delinquencies, length of delinquencies, contractor-caused cancellations, product nonconformance, and packaging nonconformance. The ABVS score is comprised of a Federal Supply Class (FSC) score, which represents the offeror's DLA-wide performance for that FSC, and a DLA score, which reflects the offeror's performance for all FSCs. /1/ RFP at 20. Both the FSC and DLA scores include scores for quality and delivery. The RFP provided for award to the offeror whose proposal, conforming to the solicitation, was determined to be the "best value" to the government based on past performance, price and other related factors. The past performance factor included three subfactors: (1) product quality--conformance to contract requirements, specifications, and standards of good workmanship; (2) delivery--timeliness of performance; and (3) business relations--effective management and commitment to customer satisfaction. Performance was more important than price, and quality performance was more important than delivery performance. The non-price factors combined were significantly more important than price. Ten proposals, including Delco's and Weckworth's, were received by the closing time. Following a request for clarification of past performance information and issuance of an amendment increasing quantities and extending delivery dates, six offerors, including Delco and Weckworth, submitted final proposal revisions. In the evaluation, DSCP determined that Weckworth's proposal, priced at $1,823,406, offered the best value, with FSC and DLA quality scores of 100, an FSC delivery score of 78.1, and a DLA delivery score of 86.6. Agency Report (AR), Tab 10, Source Selection Decision Document, at 2. Delco's proposal, priced at $1,881,800, also was evaluated with FSC and DLA quality scores of 100, and received an FSC delivery score of 82.2 and a DLA delivery score of 96.1. Id. Although Delco's ABVS delivery scores were slightly higher than Weckworth's, the agency ultimately concluded that Weckworth's delivery performance was superior to Delco's based on information in Delco's proposal regarding late deliveries under two current contracts. Specifically, the protester noted that, under one current contract, it was late delivering three items: one item was to be delivered by February 8, 2003 but was not delivered until March 25, 47 days late; a second item had a contract delivery date of February 8 but was not delivered until March 27, 49 days late; and a third item had a contract delivery date of February 15 but was not received until April 23, 46 days late. Additionally, two other items under this contract, with delivery dates of February 22 and March 1, had not yet been delivered at the time of evaluation. On the second contract, Delco's proposal noted that two items had delivery dates of April 23 but had not yet been delivered. AR at 9.