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JSchaus & Associates
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Federal Pricing Group
www.federalpricinggroup.com

11. GAO 2020 Protests – Pricing
Highlights (and Lowlights)
Wednesday,
November 11, 2020

12. 2020 – Fed Gov Con Webinar Series - Washington DC
JSchaus & Associates
• GAO protests offer key pricing intelligence information including:
• Winning and losing prices
• Government’s overall adjustments to cost/pricing
• Government’s cost/pricing evaluation methods
• Clues on competitor pricing/bidding strategies
• Government willingness/reluctance for paying premiums
• Opportunity to learn from (and avoid) other’s mistakes
• Let’s review some 2020 protests from pricing perspective

13. 2020 – Fed Gov Con Webinar Series - Washington DC
JSchaus & Associates
• GAO Protest #: B-418535 – Air Force (Administrative Support Services)
• Gov’t deemed offeror’s price unrealistic and offeror lost
• GAO (sadly) dismissed protest as untimely
• RFQ defined minimum realism cut-off as 25% of average bid prices
• Loser did not raise issue that AF applied average minus 25% bidder at time of
protest (AF evaluation was inconsistent with Sec M)
• Protestor did not carefully review Sec M sufficiently to note the flaw. Could
have resolved with a clarifying question.
Pricing Ambiguities Must Be Clarified and/or Challenged

14. 2020 – Fed Gov Con Webinar Series - Washington DC
JSchaus & Associates
• GAO Protest #: B-418467 (Army, Linguist Services, May 2020)
• RFP required primes and subs to submit 3 years of pool and base information for
their indirect rates (if they didn’t have other approved rates cited by RFP)
• Offeror’s subcontractor did not submit requested indirect cost information
• Government rejected protestor’s bid as unacceptable
Subcontractor Non-Compliance with RFP
Primes must ensure subcontractor pricing submissions are compliant

15. 2020 – Fed Gov Con Webinar Series - Washington DC
JSchaus & Associates
• B-418875.2 (DOI Cybersecurity Support Services IT-70 Task Order)
• Best value T&M task order (19 bidders). Solicitation included labor hour estimates
• Protestor claimed winner bid inexperienced staff to achieve a lower (unrealistic)
price and that the Gov’t was required to perform a price realism review
• GAO denied because RFToP stated Government ‘reserved the right’ to conduct price
realism review (and the protestor’s allegation was unsupported)
The option to evaluate ‘Price Realism’ isn’t a mandate
If price realism isn’t mandatory prepare for a price shootout

16. 2020 – Fed Gov Con Webinar Series - Washington DC
JSchaus & Associates
Offeror Technical Past
Performance
Price
A Unacceptable Low Risk $57,910,432
B Unacceptable Low Risk $45,675,104
C Unacceptable Low Risk $43,800,300
D Outstanding Low Risk $44,926,476
E Unacceptable Low Risk $48,565,262
F Outstanding Low Risk $48,231,840
G Unacceptable Low Risk $49,959,084
Winner Outstanding Low Risk $39,912,886
I Unacceptable Low Risk $69,929,900
Protestor Unacceptable Low Risk $59,999,999
• B-418875.2 – June 2020 (VA SATCOM)
Sometimes, GAO protests will summarize
scores and prices of multiple bidders –
valuable information!
• Second important lesson – Appears there
were only 3 real competitive bids. What
were the rest of them thinking?
• See B-416377.6 – April 2020 (DoJ IT Support
Services) for another great pricing gem
Pricing Gems – Use Protests to Glean Pricing Behavior…

17. 2020 – Fed Gov Con Webinar Series - Washington DC
JSchaus & Associates
• Protests can be a great
resource for insights on
Government’s cost/price
evaluation sources and
methods
• DoJ protest contains some
pricing strategy gems too
Government Price Evaluation Methods and Insights
Protest Case Evaluation Methods
B-418390.2 – NSF Artic Research Support Total Compensation Plan
B-418525 – Forest Service IT Support Comparison of initial and
revised labor pricing
B-417616.2 – DISA GSM-O II Salary source and
percentiles used
B-416588.3 – DoJ Training Support Services Total Compensation Plan
B-418352 - USTRANSCOM – Architecture,
Data, Engineering Services
Price realism -
Unrealistically low rates

18. 2020 – Fed Gov Con Webinar Series - Washington DC
JSchaus & Associates
The Government is sometimes willing to pay premiums
Protest Case Premium $ Premium %
B-418620 – DHS – Jul 2020 (Intensive Supervision Appearance Program IV) $611M 31%
B-418352.3 – USTRANSCOM – Aug 2020 (Architecture, Data, Engineering Services) $50M 57%
B-418896 – Navy – Sep 2020 (Barge Overhaul and Inspection) $548K 14%
B-418490 – Army – May 2020 (Cybersecurity, Network Ops, & Maintenance of IT Support) $24M 42%
B-417785.5 – Army – Aug 2020 (Base Operations & Maintenance Support Services) $21M 12%
B-418655 – Air Force – Jul 2020 (Engineering Data Support Services) $20M 10%

19. 2020 – Fed Gov Con Webinar Series - Washington DC
JSchaus & Associates
Best Practice – Research Protests Before RFP to Inform Pricing
Sources Sought
• Incumbent research
• Initial solutioning
• Data calls
• Protest research
RFP
• Price exhibits
• Cost volume
• Basis of estimate
• Subcontractors
Contract Award
• De-brief data
• Protest data
• Postmortems
• FOIA requests
Plan Propose Prepare

20. THANK YOU!
JSchaus & Associates
Washington DC
hello@JenniferSchaus.com
www.JenniferSchaus.com
+ 1 – 2 0 2 – 3 6 5 – 0 5 9 8
Michael Gallo
mgallo@federalpricinggroup.com
(240) 397-9409