Dalpar Corporation

B-414285 Apr 24, 2017 Jump To VIEW DECISION DOWNLOADS RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights Dalpar Corporation, a small business of Fort Walton Beach, Florida, challenges the award of a contract to Telum Corporation, a small business of Southern Pines, North Carolina, under solicitation No. FA0021-16-R-0040 issued by the Department of the Air Force for tactical air traffic control training services. Dalpar contends that the agency's professional compensation and price realism analyses were unreasonable. We deny the protest. We deny the protest. View Decision DOCUMENT FOR PUBLIC RELEASE The decision issued on the date below was subject to a GAO Protective Order. This version, with no redactions, has been approved for public release. Decision Matter of:  Dalpar Corporation File:  B-414285 Date:  April 24, 2017 Robert A. Goodwin III, Esq., Keefe, Anchors & Gordon, PA, for the protester. Joseph A. Whitcomb, Esq., Whitcomb, Selinsky, McAuliffe, PC, for the intervenor. Alexis J. Bernstein, Esq., Heather M. Mandelkehr, Esq., Department of the Air Force, for the agency. Michael Willems, Esq., Eric M. Ransom, Esq., and Edward Goldstein, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST 1.  Protest challenging the agency’s evaluation of awardee’s proposed professional compensation plan is denied where the record shows that the plan was not unrealistic for the work proposed. 2.  Allegation that agency failed to consider fringe rates as part of professional compensation analysis is denied where the protester was not prejudiced by the alleged failure. DECISION Dalpar Corporation, a small business of Fort Walton Beach, Florida, challenges the award of a contract to Telum Corporation, a small business of Southern Pines, North Carolina, under solicitation No. FA0021-16-R-0040 issued by the Department of the Air Force for tactical air traffic control training services.  Dalpar contends that the agency’s professional compensation and price realism analyses were unreasonable. We deny the protest BACKGROUND On September 23, 2016, the Air Force issued request for proposals (RFP) No. FA0021‑16-R-0040 for air traffic control training services for Air Force Special Operations Command units.  Contracting Officer’s Statement of Facts (CO’s  Statement) at 2.  The competition was set aside in its entirety for socially and economically disadvantaged small business concerns.  Id.  The RFP contemplated the award of a single fixed-price contract for a base period of 10 months followed by two 1‑year options, and provided that award would be made on the basis of three factors:  (1) price; (2) technical; and (3) past performance.  RFP at 2, 55.  The solicitation noted that award would be made to the lowest-priced technically acceptable proposal, and outlined a multi-step evaluation methodology.  Id. at 53‑54.  As an initial step, the solicitation provided that evaluators would calculate a total evaluated price (TEP) for each proposal, using a worksheet attached to the solicitation.  Id. at 55.  Of note, the worksheet required offerors to provide detailed hourly rate information for a single labor category (Air Traffic Control Instructor) at each of the three duty locations covered by the contract.  In this regard, offerors were to provide a fully-burdened instructor labor rate for each location, as well as the labor rate build‑up information (base labor rate, fringe benefit rate, overhead rate, general and administrative rate, and profit).  See e.g. Dalpar Price Proposal at 61.  The worksheet also established that a full productive work year for each instructor constituted 1,880 hours.  Id. After calculating the TEP, the evaluators were to assess each proposal’s TEP for accuracy, completeness, fairness, unbalanced pricing, and reasonableness.[1]  RFP at 55-56.  The RFP further indicated that the agency would perform a professional employee compensation evaluation as provided by Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) provision 52.222-46 (Evaluation of Compensation for Professional Employees).  Id.  Following this evaluation, the RFP indicated that offerors would be ranked from lowest TEP to highest TEP, with the lowest TEP offer to be selected for further evaluation.  Id. at 54.  The solicitation then provided that the lowest TEP offer would be evaluated for technical acceptability, and if any subfactor received an “unacceptable” rating, the proposal would be ineligible for award and the next lowest-priced proposal would be evaluated.  Id.