DynCorp ran afoul of entity code requirement
By
Nick Wakeman
In another example of how procurement officials can go strictly by the book, DynCorp International sees another protest denied because of mismatched entity codes.
DynCorp International has lost another Army contract because of problems with the entity code it submitted as part of a bid for Army task order.
In July, the company lost a bid protest when the Government Accountability Office said the Army was correct in rejecting DynCorp’s bid for a $180 million task order to provide maintenance, supply and transportation services at Fort Bliss, Texas.
The commercial and government entity code, or CAGE code, DynCorp used in its task order bid through the Army's EAGLE vehicle didn’t match the CAGE code used to win a spot on that vehicle. Because of the mismatch, the Army said that DynCorp’s task order was unacceptable.
Now it has happened again. This time for logistics support services at Fort Polk, Louisiana. DynCorp’s protest of this task order has come before an award was made and is challenging terms of the solicitation.
It both protests, it appears that DynCorp (in the process of being acquired by Amentum) is arguing about the ability to submit past performance qualifications with a different CAGE code than the one used to bid on EAGLE originally.
GAO said that the crux of the dispute is “tension between the solicitation’s use of the terms offeror and subcontractor on the one hand and DynCorp’s status as an entity with multiple CAGE codes on the other.” The Army EAGLE contract also identifies only one CAGE code for DynCorp.
DynCorp argued that solicitation restricted competition because it didn’t allow a clear way for the company to submit its own past performance.
The Army said it would allow past performance from different CAGE codes from the same company. But all CAGE codes had to be listed as subcontractors and they had to perform at least 20 percent of the work.
The Army also said it wanted to limit past performance to the entities that would perform most to the work. Their argument is that the CAGE code on the EAGLE contract is the entity that will do the work. They said they’d get a large volume of past performance to review and wanted narrow what they had to evaluate.
In the end, GAO ruled the Army’s “approach is unobjectionable.”
DynCorp can still submit a bid, but can’t use past performance from parts of the company that have a different CAGE code.
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