In light of today's emphasis on acquisiiton speed, especially by the Department of War, we think this is an urgent matterr that Wifcon members ought to discuss:
In CWTSato Travel, Comp. Gen. Dec. B-423181,2, Dec. 19, 2025, the GAO denied a protest GSA's award of an order for commercial travel agent services against a Federal Supply Schedule. The decision is attached.
In a procurement for the Marine Corps, GSA issued a request for quotations in accordance with FAR 8.405-2 on August 19, 2024. Here is what the quotes were to include, as described by the GAO:
The GAO described the evaluation factors as follows:
There were the final evaluation results for the protester, CWTSato, and the awardee:
CWTSato
Omega
Factor A
Pass
Pass
Factor B
Good
Good
Factor C
Very Relevant / Limited Confidence / High Risk
Relevant / Substantial Confidence / Low Risk
Factor D
Acceptable
Acceptable
Factor E - POS Pricing
$18,366,418
$24,701,978
Factor E - MSF Pricing
$18,366,418
$24,702,974
According to the GAO, the contracting officer decided to pay the higher "price" based on the evaluations of past performance.
It appears to have taken the GSA more than a year to complete its commericial FSS selection/award process, which was clearly based on the FAR Part 15 process model. See https://www.wifcon.com/anal/analcomproc.htm
Some questions:
Did anything in FAR 8.405-2 require GSA to use such a procedure?
Could they have asked for experience and past performance information and price, without the other stuff, selected Omega on that basis, and then negotiated performance plans and procedures one-on-one with them before making the award, without further communications with CWTSato? If not, why not?
Would that have taken less work and time?
If so, why do you think they conducted the procurement the way they did?
GAO B-423181.2.pdf
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