PCI’s April 4 edition of The Case of the Month Club will feature a bid protest and a Contract Disputes Act claim decision. The protest decision is the GAO’s decision in VSolvit, LLC, B-421048, Dec. 6, 2022, 2022 CPD ¶ 310, where GAO dismissed as untimely a protester’s challenge to the agency’s refusal to evaluate experience in the way the contractor had advocated during the procurement. This decision contains a good discussion of a question that has puzzled many observers, i.e., when should a communication that is not labeled as a protest nevertheless be considered to be a de facto agency-level protest? The decision also contains a helpful discussion of why the protester’s claim that it was entitled to a Certificate of Competency review should be denied. In the claims decision, Wu & Associates v. General Services Administration, CBCA 6760, 21-1 BCA ¶ 37965, the Civilian Board of Contract Appeals provides a detailed breakdown and discussion of every item in a construction contractor’s claim for a constructive change. The board’s opinion is a useful tutorial on the standards that a contractor must satisfy when pursuing such claims, particularly whether work directed by the Government required by the contract’s original scope of work. Please join our experts Tracye Howard and Brian Walsh as they explain what we should learn from these two recent decisions.
