[Protest of Issuance of Delivery Order]

A firm protested the issuance of a delivery order by the Secret Service for dictation equipment. Price quotations had been requested and received from both the protester and the awardee. After giving a quotation, the protester told the contracting officer that the bid must come from its Washington office, and the protester contended that it was questionable whether the agency received its proper price quotation. However, GAO concluded that the protester failed to prove that it did not knowingly offer a best and final price quotation to the agency. In addition, GAO concluded that the protester was given an opportunity to submit its bid and that the procurement officer acted properly by relying upon the protester's quotation, because a principal is bound by the acts of his agent when an agent acts with apparent authority. Further, since the delivery order had already been awarded, a low quotation received later from the protester was properly rejected. Absent actual notice of a price reduction, a contracting officer need not consider a price reduction in determining the low price. Since the protester has not alleged that the contracting agent had received actual notice of a quantity discount that was later mentioned by the protester, he was justified in not considering the discount when evaluating the protester's quotation. Accordingly, the protest was denied.