CharDonnay Dialysis, LLC

The procurement

Hemodialysis and peritoneal dialysis treatment services at the Federal Medical Center in Devens, Massachusetts, under a fixed-unit-price requirements contract (base year plus four option years). Award was a best-value tradeoff: technical and past performance were equally weighted, and price was about equal to the non-price factors combined. NaphCare proposed $19,398,360; CharDonnay, the incumbent, proposed $19,555,546.

The protest

Both offerors were rated Very Good for technical and Exceptional for past performance. The SSA's tradeoff was one paragraph: the two were the same on non-price factors, so price was paramount, and NaphCare's lower price made it the better value. CharDonnay argued that BOP had turned a best-value tradeoff into a lowest-price selection by comparing ratings instead of what the proposals actually offered.

The agency’s answer

BOP said the proposals were essentially equal on the non-price factors, as their identical ratings reflected, so price properly became the deciding factor. The solicitation made price about as important as the non-price factors combined, and the SSA chose the lower-priced of two equally rated proposals.

What decided it

Matching ratings don't show the proposals are equal; the SSA had to compare what each one offered before letting price decide.

GAO found that the SSA's entire tradeoff noted the identical ratings and declared price paramount. The record did not show that the agency looked behind the adjectival ratings, or compared the proposals in any way, before finding them technically equal. GAO denied CharDonnay's other grounds (its late final proposal revision, discussions, and the price and technical evaluations) and recommended a new, documented source selection decision, termination of NaphCare's contract if another offeror is the better value, and reimbursement of CharDonnay's protest costs.