Jump to content

PD216ohio

Members
  • Posts

    55
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Everything posted by PD216ohio

  1. Email or even texts are fine. I handle all of the service work for a couple national chains in my region. Almost all communication is by text. After about 15 years of being their main guy things are very simplified with regard to communication. I don't even write contracts anymore. I send them a quote, they email me back to go ahead, I do the work and send them an invoice and I get paid. It's a nice simple system. In my case, I personally perform on all of my projects. It's one of the things that has kept me working through all of these years because my clients know they are getting my personal quality of work, not just an employee or sub of mine. I guess it makes it an odd transition into government work where companies as small as mine might not be as common. I've done two government projects so far and both ended with extraordinary comments about the quality I've provided. To me, that is the best part. I really take pride in a job well done.
  2. Thank you, I appreciate that. It is just frustrating. If I am awarded, I have to be ready to move forward and complete a project in a timely manner... but I am at the mercy of when an award is made and if it is made. Another consideration is when I know I have sharpened my pencil and have good numbers and then I am worried about placing other bids which might result in an overlapping project. I am a small company and one at a time is our typical capacity.
  3. yes, I track all projects that I bid. If there is not an award notice, I follow up after a week or two and then additionally if I don't get responses. I've hand a handful that just never respond in any way.
  4. I'm hoping to get some perspective from the other side of things. I am a contractor so I don't really get to see the inner workings from the contracting officer's side and thought this group could shed some light. More often than I would have expected, there are solicitations (typically RFQs and RFPs) to which I respond and never see an award and most times I am unable to get a response from the contracting officer. From my viewpoint, I often put a lot of work into preparing quotes, proposals, etc. Attending pre-bids, writing out technicals, working out pricing and all of the other activities of preparing an adequate response can take a lot of time. It's one thing to not be the awardee but it's something else to never see any award made and to have COs completely ignore any phone calls and emails inquiring of the status of these solicitations. I guess my question is why does this happen? Understaffed and overworked COs? Lazy COs? A technical reason that is easier solved by ghosting respondents? I suspect most of the people here are on the government side of operations so I thought it might be a good place to solve my curiosity. Thanks.
  5. Than you for pointing out that previous conversation... it is very interesting. I think the effective answer is that the CO in this case, regardless if 52.212-1 changes anything, can ammend the solicitation at any time before award for any "legitimate" reason they claim. In this specific circumstance, 52.212-1 was incorporated (without modification) into the RFQ. The offer was due on a certain date. A little more than an hour after all offers were due, an amendment was issued to extend the due date by a week in order to arrange a site visit (which was set for the day after the original due date). I would assume that the CO can justify the extension by claiming that a site visit was requested and would generate potentially more and better offers.
  6. I say it is "either or" because the RFQ contained 52.212-1 which changes the quotation to be treated like an offer.... at least that has been successfully argued in past GAO decisions.
  7. I only suspect I may have been a sole bidder since this past week was mostly holiday time for most. I may have used the term "bid" incorrectly as it was actually a quotation or an offer actually. This RFQ contained by incorporation 52-212-1 which changes the standards of an RFQ.
  8. I am a bidder on a RFQ that was due at a certain time on a certain day. A little over an hour after the due date, the bid was extended to allow site visits. My concern is that, with the holiday week, my bid was the only one and after the due date passed the CO wanted to modify things. Is this a valid extension of the due date (now extended for another 7 days) even though the site visit was scheduled for the very next day after the amendment.
  9. I didn't mean to be insulting. I was referring to two different groups. The first group being the people here who didn't think 52212-1 changes the rfq. The second group being COs not in this discussion who don't understand or do sloppy work. As someone on the contractor side, I see many many sloppily or lazily written solicitations. However, I do see some that are superb and it kind of excites me when I do.
  10. Likewise, it is not absolute that the other bidder would win. However, without progressing, we don't have any details about that other bidder, their bid and the evaluation process.
  11. Hi ji20874, Excellent citations. I find case law extremely fascinating to read (I served 6 years as a local legislator and have created a few laws myself). You mentioned that there would still be an allowance for amendments by the CO and that I've overlooked this point apologies if I didn't mention it clearly but there was no amendment, in my opinion (for what that's worth lol). The solicitation cleary stated that experience was an evaluation factor. Many of the offerors did not submit an experience profile (inexperienced bidders, perhaps). The CO then sent an email offering them a second chance to do so. I would not call that an amendment but an offer to correct deficient bids. On edit : I wanted to add that I did some searching of GAO decisions by using the combined keywords of "rfq" and "52212-1", and that's where I felt that I found many pertinent cases as well.
  12. There are a lot of people here that don't realize that the full incorporation of 52212-1 into an rfq changes the rules of simplified acquisition. This fact has been decided so in numerous GAO cases. It seems to be a common mistake (or careless) to incorporate it and not understand what the effect is.
  13. Given that the outcome, if I win, is that another bidder will be the awardee... I do not think it is worthwhile to file and cause such a disruption to the project. I might be a pain in the butt, but I'm not a complete jerk, lol. I do feel rather confident that I would win the case but lose the award. FWIW, I just completed a project that was protested against my award, GAO ruled in favor of the award (it was a pretty clear cut case but still took around 90 days to resolve).
  14. (f) prohibits late submissions. Why do I think 15.206 does not apply? Because the solicitation already stated that evaluations are based on price and experience. After quotes were received, the CO made a decision to allow people to add their experience to their quote because they didn't feel that was clear somehow. This isn't the same as saying, "oh, we think we should have asked for experience" after quotes were received and the due date had passed.
  15. The solicitation originally stated that price and exeperience were the evaluation factors in section M. Section L listed the things that a quote must contain to be evaluated, experience was not included there. Now, I suppose a quote could be considered without experience but it wouldn't fare well. The CO has stated that it intended to include an experience form but forgot to... So they remedied it by sending out the experience form after the due date (which is prohibited since they included all of 52212-1 in the solicitation). The entire situation is a cluster. I suppose I could protest and simply ask that the remedy be a resolicitation. Not sure if that's even an option but that might be my better opportunity given the facts thus far.
  16. I am an interested party and, not to be silly, there is no guarantee that the one remaining lower bidder would be able to accept or complete the project. Any number of things could potentially happen between now and 100 days from now.
  17. Hi Pepe, I just received some final clarification on the debriefing. It does appear that the one vendor ahead of me is in full compliance. I am also very confident that the 3 others ahead of me would be removed if a protest ensued. I am sure the COs hate me by now. If I were to file the protest, I would do so pro se. Cost would be minimal. I am just not sure if there is any value in doing so. The benefit would be that I would be next in line in the event that the remaining bidder could not perform for whatever reason.... but I suspect that chance is minimal. I don't know who that bidder is so I cannot alert them to their potential good fortune if they were to file. I would consider your opinion strongly if you thought there were any value in filing. I have until Thursday. Otherwise I can let this go and be fifth in line instead. Again, I am tossed on if there is any perceivable value in filing. For the record, I have lost a countless number of bids. I don't have a problem with that. However, this situation was a clear mess up on the governments part so it took me this far into it. Also, I feel there is a decent chance I could be awarded compensation for my filing fee and perhaps time spent in filing the protest since it is of clearly meritorious grounds.
  18. I can argue that three of the bids ahead of me in price should not be considered. I am 99% confident in that argument. However, I do not have enough info yet to figure out if the single bidder ahead of me in price is legitimate. What if there is a reason they cannot perform or be entered into a contract with? Is it worthwhile on that chance to file the protest and put myself in second place ... or maybe first if something works out that way?
  19. Ok, here's an update! The CO did just supply me with the requested info from my debriefing request. The results are that only one bidder, out of nine total, was lower than me and that lower bidder is not the current awardee. I am 21% higher than that low bidder on base bid and 23% higher on the entire bid including all options. As for the evals on the relevant experience, the only "grades" I see are "very relevant" and "not relevant". Both I and the lower bidder are listed as "very relevant". I don't know how that grading scale works from an internal perspective. I suppose my only question now is whether there is any value in protesting the award since it seems like if I am successful, I will just be handing the award to the one lower bidder that is in compliance. Unless there is something that might disqualify that lower bidder... but is that a worthwhile gamble?
  20. I'm not sure if I understand you completely. I would think that responsibility would deal with one's ability to complete an awarded project or to supply the necessary documentation, etc, to complete the project. Experience, especially if stated as a factor of award (quotes will be evaluated on price and experience), is a technical factor and I would think it should be required prior to the due date. I do wonder if forgetting to include experience (or not realizing it should be included), in this case, would cause the entire quote to be rejected if only that portion was late... or if it would simply mean that the late portion (experience) could not be considered in the evaluation. In this RFQ, near the top it stated that the evaluation factors are in Section M. In Section M it simply stated: (a) The Government will award a contract resulting from this solicitation to the responsible offeror whose offer conforming to the solicitation will be most advantageous to the Government, price and other factors considered. The following factors shall be used to evaluate offers: (i) Price (ii) Relative Experience Technical and past performance, when combined, are approximately equal to cost or price. But in Section L it stated: The offeror’s proposal shall include the following elements to be considered for award: 1. Section J – Contractor Cover Sheet. 2. SF 1449 – Filled out by the offeror for: 3. Block 17a 4. Section B – To include the price for all Contract Line Item Numbers (CLINs). Each of the above uses the word "shall" which in legal terms means that it is required. So I suppose the argument can be made that if Section L requirements were received in time, the quote could be considered without any points for experience if experience wasn't submitted in time. However, section L does not state that ONLY those items are required and therefore Section L could be viewed as minimum requirements. Any modification after the due date would still be late under 52.212-1 and might still cause the entire quote to be considered late. This does lead me to a follow up question... Let's assume for easy math that my bid was 150k and the awardee was 100k. I have submitted my experience in a timely fashion and the other bidder did not. Would the "approximately equal" factor for experience be enough to bring me to the award? This is assuming their bid could be considered without the experience factor.
  21. I still have a couple days in which to file with the GAO. Getting a useful debriefing, however, has been difficult and unfulfilled. Thank you for pointing that out because I do understand how important that is. As for them amending the RFQ, it was done after the due date and after all relevant offers had been received. I don't know if that is a worthwhile distinction between late and allowable but I'll put my money on late, with fingers crossed. Excellent point on keeping the terminology correct. I will pay close attention to that. Thank you for the great insights and advice.
  22. Maybe I didn't clearly explain the primary point I was trying to make. Other bidders only submitted their experience after the due date. This was allowed by the CO who thought it wasn't clear enough in the bid but decided this a couple days after the bids were due. My point is that the incorporation of 52.212-1 into the RFQ has changed the rules and now anything submitted after the due date cannot be accepted. As I have been doing more and more research, this seems to be how the GAO sees it too. This is my position... whether I am right or wrong remains to be seen of course. lol
  23. Edit to add: M.Braun, Inc., B‑298935.2, May 21, 2007 seems to rule that the incorporation of 52.212-1 changes the rules of an RFQ and any late submissions are to be considered late. A search also finds, among others, a more recent decision that seems very clear that incorporating 52.212-1 does change the rules for late submissions, etc, in Peers Health, B-413557.3
  24. The due date was not changed. All bidders (but only those bidders) who submitted by the due date, were allowed to send the missing information. While yes, this would normally be allowable under an RFQ/Simplified Acquisition, it appears that there are many examples of where that rule was changed by language inserted (often inadvertently) by the CO. I say inadvertently because in some of those cases, the COs thought they were correct in allowing late submissions while the GAO ruled otherwise.
×
×
  • Create New...