Reston Consulting Group, Inc. (B-423493; B-423493.2; B-423493.3)

You should not care.

Category: Technical evaluation, labor category mapping

Date: 01 August 2025

URL: https://www.gao.gov/products/b-423493%2Cb-423493.2%2Cb-423493.3

Reston Consulting Group protested an IRS RFQ for IT support services issued under a BPA, arguing the agency failed to credit its additional strengths, unreasonably accepted IgniteAction’s deviations from estimated level of effort, and treated job titles in the awardee’s narrative as unpriced positions, culminating in an allegedly de facto LPTA tradeoff. GAO found the evaluation and best value decision reasonable and consistent with FAR 8.4 and the RFQ: all vendors were rated High Confidence on nonprice factors, IgniteAction’s lower price prevailed, and the record adequately explained why Reston’s asserted advantages did not merit a multimillion-dollar premium. GAO also rejected claims of inconsistency between the awardee’s management approach and price volume, reading job titles as mappings to BPA labor categories rather than as separate, unpriced FTEs.

Protest denied. Under FAR 8.4, agencies may favor lower price when technical ratings converge; where price realism is disclaimed, “understaffing” arguments are unlikely to succeed absent clear performance risk.

Digest

Protest challenging agency’s evaluation of quotations and best-value tradeoff decision is denied where the record reflects that the evaluation and decision were reasonable, consistent with the terms of the solicitation, and adequately documented.