B-298720.3, Midland Supply, Inc., May 14, 2007

B-298720.3 May 14, 2007 Jump To VIEW DECISION DOWNLOADS RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights Midland Supply, Inc. protests the award of a contract to Danaher Tool Group under request for proposals (RFP) No. 6FLS-G3-050327-N, issued by the General Services Administration (GSA) for quantities of 50 commercial line items in the 5120 Federal Supply Class (hand tools, non-edged, non-powered). The agency made a new best value determination after we sustained a prior Midland protest objecting to the award to Danaher. Midland Supply, Inc., B-298720.2, Nov. 29, 2006, 2007 CPD para. 2. Midland again challenges the agency's award for line item No. 1 for socket wrench sets (an item Midland has provided to the government since 2001) to Danaher, a firm submitting a lower technically rated, lower-priced proposal for this line item, arguing that the best value determination is irrational and arbitrary. We sustain the protest. View Decision B-298720.3, Midland Supply, Inc., May 14, 2007 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 Matter of: Midland Supply, Inc. File: B-298720.3 Date: May 14, 2007 Richard D. Lieberman, Esq., and Nicole S. Allen, Esq., McCarthy, Sweeney & Harkaway, P.C., for the protester. Adele Ross Vine, Esq., General Services Administration, for the agency. Kenneth Kilgour, Esq., and Christine S. Melody, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST Under solicitation providing for award to offeror whose proposal is found to be the most advantageous to the government based on past performance, delivery, and price, protest challenging selection decision is sustained where the record shows that the best value determination mischaracterized the relative quality of the offerors' on-time delivery records, a key factor in the selection decision. DECISION Midland Supply, Inc. protests the award of a contract to Danaher Tool Group under request for proposals (RFP) No. 6FLS-G3-050327-N, issued by the General Services Administration (GSA) for quantities of 50 commercial line items in the 5120 Federal Supply Class (hand tools, non-edged, non-powered). The agency made a new best value determination after we sustained a prior Midland protest objecting to the award to Danaher. Midland Supply, Inc., B-298720.2, Nov. 29, 2006, 2007 CPD para. 2. Midland again challenges the agency's award for line item No. 1 for socket wrench sets (an item Midland has provided to the government since 2001) to Danaher, a firm submitting a lower technically rated, lower-priced proposal for this line item, arguing that the best value determination is irrational and arbitrary. We sustain the protest. The RFP, issued on February 24, 2006, contemplated awards of fixed-price requirements contracts for a 2-year base period with three 1-year options. The RFP provided that the agency would award contracts to the responsible offerors whose proposals, conforming to the solicitation, were determined to be most advantageous to the government, past performance, delivery, and price considered. Past performance was comprised of three subfactors--on-time delivery, quality deficiency notices, and orders terminated. The RFP stated that past performance and delivery, when combined, would be considered significantly more important than price, and that if proposals were determined to be essentially technically equal, awards would be made to the firms submitting the lowest prices. The RFP required that delivery be made within 120 calendar days after receipt of order for all items, but permitted offerors to propose a more favorable delivery time. The RFP included a clause entitled –Performance History,— which states that the –vendor's Federal Supply Service (FSS) Supplier Rating Reports, from contracts for comparable products, will constitute the primary performance history for the evaluation of the offer.— RFP at 104. In evaluating proposals, the agency assigned the following raw points under the three evaluation factors: excellent (5 points); good (4 points); average (3 points); and poor (0 points). The agency used the following scale in evaluating on-time performance: excellent (90-100 percent on-time); good (80-89 percent); average (70'79 percent); and poor (under 70). These raw scores were then multiplied by the following weights: 35 percent for both past performance and delivery (for a total combined weight of 70 percent) and 30 percent for price.