Georgia Power Company; Savannah Electric and Power Company-- Costs

Two firms requested that they be reimbursed the reasonable costs of filing and pursuing protests they filed in October 2001, challenging an award made by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers under a solicitation for the privatization electric distribution services at Fort Stewart and Hunter Army Airfield. In December 2001, after receipt of the protesters comments on the agency report, the Corps took corrective action in response to the protests. Based upon the promised action, GAO dismissed the protests as academic. GAO found that since the agency unduly delayed in taking corrective action until after submission of the agency report and the protester's comments in the face of clearly meritorious protests that the agency did not, as contemplated by the solicitation, reasonably evaluate whether the awardee's past performance was for services similar in size, magnitude, and complexity to the solicitation requirement. Accordingly, the request was granted and GAO recommended that the agency reimburse the protesters their reasonable costs of filing and pursuing the protests.