Ecompex, Inc., B-292865.4; B-292865.5; B-292865.6, June 18, 2004

Ecompex, Inc., B-292865.4; B-292865.5; B-292865.6, June 18, 2004 TITLE: Ecompex, Inc., B-292865.4; B-292865.5; B-292865.6, June 18, 2004 BNUMBER: B-292865.4; B-292865.5; B-292865.6 DATE: June 18, 2004 ********************************************************************** DOCUMENT FOR PUBLIC RELEASE The decision issued on the date below was subject to a GAO Protective Order. This redacted version has been approved for public release. Decision A Matter of: Ecompex, Inc. A File: B-292865.4; B-292865.5; B-292865.6 A Date: June 18, 2004 A J. Patrick McMahon, Esq., and William Welch, Esq., Barton, Baker, McMahon, Hildebrant & Tolle, for the protester. Seth Binstock, Esq., and Catherine G. Powers, Esq., Social Security Administration, for the agency. Peter Verchinski, Esq., and John M. Melody, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST A 1. Allegation that agency unreasonably determined that protester lacked experience sufficiently similar to the work under the solicitation to qualify for award is denied where contract sought file maintenance services for a facility containing more than 4A million folders, and largest facility protester had maintained contained 125,000 folders; fact that proposed subcontractors possessed additional experience did not render agency*s determination unreasonable, since solicitation required that offeror have sufficient experience of its own. A 2. Agency reasonably attributed experience of affiliated companies to awardee where proposal demonstrated a significant nexus to the affiliates, including the proposed use of affiliates* experienced employees as key personnel, and statement that parent company would fully support the contract and that its financial resources would be available to awardee. A 3. Allegation that agency improperly concluded that awardee would comply with solicitation*s limitation on subcontracting is denied where awardee*s proposal did not take express exception to the limitation, and firm assured agency that it understood and would comply with requirement. DECISION A Ecompex, Inc. protests the award of a contract to Ahtna Enterprises Corporation (AEC) under request for proposals (RFP) No. SSA-RFP-03-0523, issued as a sectionA 8(a) set-aside by the Social Security Administration (SSA) for clerical support services at a file storage facility in Baltimore, Maryland. Ecompex challenges the evaluation of the proposals. A We deny the protest. A The solicitation, issued on May 22, 2003, provided for award of a requirements contract for a 1-year base period, with 4 option years, for all tasks necessary to operate the agency*s 4.7-million folder *Megasite* storage facility. Services to be performed under the contract included folder retrieval, refiling, validation, sequencing, and various other clerical and file management services. Award was to be made to the offeror whose proposal was determined to be the *best value* based on an evaluation under four factors: technical, experience, past performance, and price. A Under the experience factor, relevant here, offerors were to submit a narrative description of at least two prior contracts that demonstrated experience in performing work of similar complexity and size. Similar work was defined as including such things as management and operation of a centralized record storage facility for a major federal, state or commercial organization housing 3-5 million folders; management and operation of a major file storage facility requiring a staff of at least 150 people; and management and operation of a file storage area that requires a high volume of folder transfers offsite. RFP at 50.[1] Similarity would be rated as extremely similar, similar, or not similar. RFP at 51. The solicitation stated that experience of both the prime and any subcontractors would be considered, id., but also required that the offeror have *sufficient experience and resources of its own and is not relying solely on the subcontractor to provide the expertise and/or resources.* RFP at 47.