B-239080.2, Apr 16, 1990, 90-1 CPD 394
Highlights
PROCUREMENT - Bid Protests - GAO procedures - Protest timeliness - 10-day rule DIGEST: Dismissal of protest as untimely is affirmed where record confirms that protest was filed more than 10 days after agency orally notified protester of basis for protest. Stating that Tribe no longer was in line for award. Our Bid Protest Regulations require that protests be filed not later than 10 working days after the basis for protest is known or should have been known. 4 C.F.R. That Tribe learned it was no longer in line for award by March 9. The agency has confirmed that the contracting officer so informed Tribe by telephone on March 7. concluded that Tribe's protest was untimely because it was not filed with our Office until at least 13 working days after Tribe learned of its basis for protest.
B-239080.2, Apr 16, 1990, 90-1 CPD 394
PROCUREMENT - Bid Protests - GAO procedures - Protest timeliness - 10-day rule DIGEST: Dismissal of protest as untimely is affirmed where record confirms that protest was filed more than 10 days after agency orally notified protester of basis for protest.
Tribe Fleet, Inc.-- Request for Reconsideration:
Tribe Fleet, Inc., requests reconsideration of our March 30, 1990 dismissal of its protest of the award of a contract under invitation for bids No. F08637-89-B-0068, issued by the Department of the Air Force for watercraft maintenance. We dismissed the protest as untimely filed.
We affirm the dismissal.
Tribe, the fourth low bidder under the solicitation, protested the reinstatement of the second and third low bidders, whose bids initially had been determined nonresponsive for failure to include unit prices as required by the solicitation. (The low bid also apparently had been found nonresponsive for other reasons.) Tribe's protest submission, received March 28, indicated that it had learned of the reinstatement of the bids during the week of March 5. Tribe apparently telephoned the office of its congressman to complain later that week, and followed up the phone call with a letter dated March 13, which Tribe included in its protest submission. On March 14, Tribe received a letter from the contracting officer, dated March 9, stating that Tribe no longer was in line for award. Based on this letter, Tribe filed its protest letter (dated March 27) in our Office on March 28.
Our Bid Protest Regulations require that protests be filed not later than 10 working days after the basis for protest is known or should have been known. 4 C.F.R. Sec. 21.2(a)(2) (1989). We determined, based upon Tribe's submission, that Tribe learned it was no longer in line for award by March 9, the end of the week during which Tribe first contacted its congressman about the matter, and the agency has confirmed that the contracting officer so informed Tribe by telephone on March 7. concluded that Tribe's protest was untimely because it was not filed with our Office until at least 13 working days after Tribe learned of its basis for protest.
Tribe claims it was not aware of its basis for protest until March 14, the date it received the agency's written notification that it no longer was in line for award; Tribe asserts that the agency's prior telephonic notification was insufficient to give it the specific knowledge of the agency's intended action necessary to start the 10-day period running. However, as indicated above, the documents Tribe submitted with its protest indicate that the firm complained to its congressman about the agency's intended action shortly following its receipt of the oral notification. This clearly shows that Tribe was on notice of its basis for protest at that juncture. See MIDDCO, Inc.-- Request for Recon., B-235587.2, Oct. 31, 1989, 89-2 CPD Para. 402.
The dismissal is affirmed.