Infra Insight Blog

The Government Accountability Office’s (GAO) annual report on federal bid protests includes useful insights into federal procurement trends that can help state and local government agencies mitigate bid protest risks. Among other findings, the GAO’s 2025 fiscal year report identified unreasonable technical evaluation, unreasonable cost or price evaluation, and unreasonable rejection of proposal as the three most prevalent reasons for sustained protests. Examining the cases identified by the GAO as exemplars for each of those reasons can help public owners understand procurement practice pitfalls that could expose them to protest.

Unreasonable Technical Evaluation

In emissary LLC, (B-422388.3, B-422388.4), the GAO sustained a protest of a best-value tradeoff award for technical support services regarding legislative and program policy and analysis. In sustaining the protest, the GAO identified several errors made by the procuring agency in the technical evaluation of proposals, including:

• assigning an adjectival rating of “outstanding” for the winning proposer’s technical score, even though the proposal did not meet the solicitation’s requirements for an evaluation element;
• failing to evaluate proposers’ phase-in plans qualitatively (rather than on a pass/fail basis), as required by the solicitation;
• determining a key personnel candidate met minimum required qualifications, despite the candidate’s resume lacking evidence of such qualifications; and
• failing to consider contradictions in the organizational reporting structures described in the winning proposer’s technical approach and its organizational conflict of interest mitigation plan.

Unreasonable Cost or Price Evaluation

In KBR Servs., LLC; Vectrus Systems Corp., (B-422697 et al.), the GAO sustained the protestors’ objections to the procuring agency’s cost/price evaluation, among other errors, in a best-value tradeoff award for prepositioned stock support. During evaluations, the agency discovered the eventual winning proposer had failed to include small business subcontracting information in its cost/price proposal, which the solicitation required. After confirming the winning proposer intended to use small business subcontracting through email correspondence, the agency unilaterally created and evaluated a risk-adjusted price to reflect potential subcontracting costs for the proposer’s cost/price proposal without opening discussions and requesting updated proposal information. The GAO found the agency’s attempt to cure the winning proposer’s flawed cost/price proposal and the agency’s evaluation of the risk-adjusted price to be unreasonable.

Unreasonable Rejection of Proposal

In SynergisT JV, LLC, (B-422384.2, B-422384.4), the GAO sustained a proposer’s protest of the procuring agency’s rejection of the proposer’s quotation in a best-value trade-off award for project management and cyber security compliance services. The agency rejected the quotation because certain labor categories included in the proposer’s quotation were not listed under the same “special item number” specified in the applicable solicitation. However, the solicitation document did not preclude proposers from submitting quotations under alternative applicable special item numbers, so the GAO found the agency’s rejection unreasonable.

These cases highlight the importance of:

• drafting clear pass/fail and evaluation criteria in solicitation documents;
• following solicitation document evaluation criteria and legal requirements when evaluating proposals;
• documenting justification for ratings and awards in a manner consistent with solicitation documents; and
• identifying internal inconsistencies in proposals and complying with solicitation documents and legal requirements with respect to the cure or rejection of proposals.

To read the entire GAO Bid Protest Annual Report to Congress for Fiscal Year 2025, click here.