GAO warns: bidders must adapt after the solicitation changes

A new Government Accountability Office decision that went against Systems Planning and Analysis has this clear message that should resonate across the market:

When an agency amends a solicitation, you better also amend your proposal.

SPA filed a protest after Science Applications International Corp. won an $85 million contract with the Defense Threat Reduction Agency for advisory and assistance services.

SAIC won the contract for the first time in 2023 and SPA filed a protest. In September 2023, DTRA took a corrective action to address SPA’s challenges.

SAIC won the contract a second time in April, after which SPA filed a second protest. SPA claimed the agency was wrong to declare the company’s proposal unacceptable, according to the GAO decision unsealed Monday.

SPA argued that the agency conducted misleading discussions that caused the company to submit a proposal that was unacceptable for the mission capability factor, one of three factors being evaluated along with price and past performance. Mission capability and past performance were ranked as more important than price.

GAO found that SPA didn’t update its proposal to account for changes DTRA made to the performance work statement. The changes added new requirements bidders had to meet.

SPA submitted a proposal that matched up with the requirements in the original solicitation, not the amended one. GAO's decision detailed how DTRA found this to be a material failure, which introduced contract performance risk.

SPA told GAO that when the company asked about changes to proposals, DTRA said it would still evaluate proposals according to the original criteria. That response led SPA to believe it did not need to revise its mission capabilities proposal.

GAO said that while DTRA’s response could have been clearer, it is still the responsibility of the bidder to make sure their proposals meet the requirements of the solicitation. That includes all amendments and revisions to the RFP.

GAO also said that there was nothing in DTRA’s response to SPA’s questions that should have given the company an impression that it could ignore the revisions.

SPA argued that DTRA should have reopened discussions with the company after it found the deficiencies in its proposal, but GAO disagreed.

“The agency is not required to conduct successive rounds of discussions until all proposal defects have been corrected,” GAO wrote.

Because the contract was awarded as a task order under the OASIS vehicle, there is nowhere else SPA can go to argue its case. Federal courts do not have authority over task order protests.