A firm protested the Department of Veterans Affairs' (VA) rejection of its late bid for cleaning, carpentry, and painting services, contending that its agent timely delivered the bid to the VA facility 2 days before bid opening and VA mishandled the bid. GAO held that the bid was late because the protester's agent delivered it to the wrong location at the VA facility. Accordingly, the protest was...

PROCUREMENT - Sealed Bidding - Bids - Late submission - Acceptance criteria - Government mishandling DIGEST: Bid delivered to contracting agency's central switchboard area before bid opening but not received at location specified in solicitation until after bid opening properly was rejected as late where paramount cause of late delivery was bidder's failure to ensure that label identifying content...