Don’t Assume the Government Received Your Email Proposal – Verify | PNWC’s Government Contracting Update

The Treasury Department issued a “best value” solicitation for cybersecurity services. Blue Glacier was one of the bidders but its bid, according to the Treasury Department, was late. Bids were due at 2:00 PM (Eastern). Blue Glacier submitted its bid via email around 11:00 AM, approximately three hours before the cut-off. There was a problem however. Blue Glacier’s email bid, it was eventually discovered was quarantined in Treasury’s email filtering system due to suspected “phishing”. Blue Glacier assumed that its bid was received since previous correspondence to the same email address was received and responded to. After a couple of months and not hearing anything from Treasury, Blue Glacier contacted Treasury to inquire the status of the procurement. Treasury told Blue Glacier that it had never received its bid and was not in contention for the contract. When Treasury awarded the contract to another bidder, Blue Glacier appealed stating that:

Source: PNWC’s Government Contracting Update: Don’t Assume the Government Received Your Email Proposal – Verify