B-299305, Mathews Associates, Inc., March 5, 2007

B-299305 Mar 05, 2007 Jump To VIEW DECISION DOWNLOADS RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights Mathews Associates, Inc. protests the rejection of its proposal submitted in response to request for proposals (RFP) No. W15P7T-06-R-N204, issued by the Department of the Army's Communications-Electronics Life Cycle Management Command to procure loudspeakers and battery boxes for use in the Single Channel Ground and Airborne Radio System. Mathews argues that the Army unreasonably rejected its proposal after concluding that every page of the proposal exceeded the solicitation's specified margin limitations. We deny the protest. View Decision B-299305, Mathews Associates, Inc., March 5, 2007 Decision Matter of: Mathews Associates, Inc. File: B-299305 Date: March 5, 2007 William M. Weisberg, Esq., and Joyce L. Tong, Esq., Sullivan & Worcester, for the protester. Brian E. Toland, Esq., and Karin S. Wiechmann, Esq., Department of the Army, for the agency. Ralph O. White, Esq., and Christine S. Melody, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST Protester's contention that agency unreasonably refused to evaluate its proposal is denied where the solicitation clearly indicated that any page of an offeror's proposal that exceeded the margin, font, or total page limits would not be evaluated, and there is no dispute that the protester's proposal exceeded the solicitation's margin limits on every page. DECISION Mathews Associates, Inc. protests the rejection of its proposal submitted in response to request for proposals (RFP) No. W15P7T-06-R-N204, issued by the Department of the Army's Communications-Electronics Life Cycle Management Command to procure loudspeakers and battery boxes for use in the Single Channel Ground and Airborne Radio System. Mathews argues that the Army unreasonably rejected its proposal after concluding that every page of the proposal exceeded the solicitation's specified margin limitations. We deny the protest. The solicitation here was issued on October 12, 2006, and anticipated the award of up to two fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contracts, for a period of 5 years, to the offeror(s) whose proposal(s) offered the best value to the government. The solicitation was issued as a small business set-aside, and established a minimum contract value of $2.9 million, and a lifetime ceiling of $120 million. The solicitation instructions limited proposals to 25 pages, specified the margin settings and font sizes to be used, and required that proposals be submitted electronically. RFP sect. L.1. In addition, the RFP advised that –pages that exceed the margin, font or total page limit will not be evaluated.— RFP sect. L.2. By the November 27 closing date, the agency received seven proposals, which were screened for conformance with the solicitation submission requirements before being sent to the Source Selection Evaluation Board (SSEB) for evaluation. The proposal submitted by Mathews, and a proposal submitted by another offeror, were removed from consideration as a result of this screening; thus, they were never evaluated by the SSEB. By letter dated December 15, the agency advised Mathews that its proposal would not be evaluated because it had not been prepared in accordance with the margin requirements specified in the solicitation. Specifically, the agency concluded that the proposal submitted by Mathews violated the solicitation's limitations, as shown in the table below. Solicitation's Margin Rqmts. Margins in the Mathews Proposal Top 1— 0.87— Bottom 1— 0.5— Left 1— 1— Right 1— 1— From edge: -- Header -- Footer 0.5— 0.5— 0.28— 0.18— After Mathews asked the agency to reconsider its decision, and after the agency advised it would not, Mathews filed a protest with our Office on December 21. Mathews argues that the Army position is unreasonable. It notes first that since the proposal was submitted electronically, it would have been a simple matter for Mathews--or the Army--to change the margin settings in the proposal. Mathews points out that if the proposal, as reformatted, exceeds the 25-page limit, the Army could reasonably refuse to read any portion of the proposal that exceeds the page limit.