TEP = Sum of Labor Rates

If I understand the situation correctly, the agency is requesting hourly labor rates but is not factoring in the estimated usage of each labor category when calculating the TEP.  Such a method of calculating TEP is not acceptable as it does not reflect the expected cost to the government and could produce a misleading result.  See for example the protest of R&G Food Service, Inc., d/b/a Port-A-Pit Catering, B-296435.4; B-296435.9.  (http://www.gao.gov/decisions/bidpro/2964354.pdf)   It states, in part:

Quote

Agencies must consider cost to the government in evaluating proposals, and while it is up to the agency to decide upon some appropriate and reasonable method for the evaluation of offerors’ prices, an agency may not use an evaluation method that produces a misleading result. The method chosen must also include some reasonable basis for evaluating or comparing the relative costs of proposals, so as to establish whether one offeror’s proposal would be more or less costly than another’s. For example, in Health Servs. Int’l, Inc., the solicitation contemplated the award of a fixed-price, indefinite-quantity contract and offerors' proposals were required to include hourly rates for six categories of labor. We sustained a protest challenging the agency's price evaluation because it was based solely upon offerors' average hourly labor rates, without consideration of the estimated quantities of each labor category the agency expected to order, and thereby failed to establish whether one offeror's proposal was in fact more or less costly than another's.

(Citations omitted.)

I agree with Lionel and have read similar protest decisions.

There needs to be more definitive pricing information to evaluate than individual labor rates, such as a sample task or seed task with actual labor categories and proposed hours that will allow comparisons of overall price for price reasonableness, possibly realism, and for comparison between proposers.

Remember that GSA has pioneered awarding IDIQ contracts with no pricing at all for which there will be competition at the task order level.  The GAO overruled the protest against that method.  So it is not so clear cut anymore.

Boof said:

Remember that GSA has pioneered awarding IDIQ contracts with no pricing at all for which there will be competition at the task order level.

Isn't the DOD currently bringing this back?

Yes, but DoD will have statutory authorization to do it.

@Don Mansfield niiiiice! Good move. #MCGA

Boof said:

Remember that GSA has pioneered awarding IDIQ contracts with no pricing at all for which there will be competition at the task order level.  The GAO overruled the protest against that method.  So it is not so clear cut anymore.

How was that section M structured? Did it state that it wasn't going to evaluate price as part of the best value evaluation? This section M clearly states that price is part of the evaluation and has a distinct weighting compared to other evaluation factors.

On 5/16/2017 at 9:11 PM, Mayonayze said:

Thoughts?

I've got exactly one: "dumbest thing I've ever heard, and the knucklehead who came up with it should be drummed out of the profession".

On 5/17/2017 at 2:41 PM, Boof said:

Remember that GSA has pioneered awarding IDIQ contracts with no pricing at all for which there will be competition at the task order level

But this "evaluation scheme" implies price will be evaluated by saying that they will sum rates!      

Maybe this is the time to step away from focusing on the clearly goofy attempt at crafting an SSP and move on to asking what exactly it is they are trying to accomplish?  This looks like one of those ones where GAO would say to a post-award protest "good point, but you should have made that point before the solicitation closed".

Quote

For clarification:

LCAT / HOURLY RATE

PM /120

PC / 70

SE / 110

ME / 90

JE / 50

TEP 440

What clarification?

It is implicit that they think all labor categories will use the same number of hours, whether that be one hour or 2080 hours.