[Protest of Proposed Navy Contract Award]

A firm protested the proposed award of a contract under an invitation for bids (IFB) issued by the Navy for grounds maintenance. The protester contended that: (1) the IFB minimum manning requirement unduly restricted competition; (2) the equipment specification went beyond the government's minimum needs; (3) the solicitation should have included a value engineering clause; (4) since the solicitation placed ordering at the sole discretion of a specific official, the necessity of placing the orders in good faith was avoided; (5) the standard inspection of services clause was in conflict with another solicitation specification; (6) the solicitation's consequences clause established a systematic method for the Navy to deny credit for partial or substantial performance; and (7) the IFB payment clause was in violation of Defense Acquisition Regulations (DAR). GAO found that: (1) minimum manning requirements are permissible; (2) there was no basis for questioning the equipment specification; (3) bidders were not prejudiced by the omission of the value engineering clause, and the protester was not prejudiced by the solicitation's ordering provision; (4) the same rights were reserved to the government under the standard inspection of services clause and the allegedly conflicting IFB specification; (5) the consequences clause would unnecessarily raise the government's costs; and (6) there was no showing that the IFB payment provision deviated from the DAR. Accordingly, the protest was denied in part and sustained in part; however, since competition was adequate and the protester did not appear to have been prejudiced, GAO stated that cancellation and resolicitation were not warranted.