In fiscal year 2022, the number of cases filed with GAO was down 12% when compared with the cases filed in 2021 (1,659 filed in 2022 versus 1,897 from 2021). Of these cases, 455 protests were resolved on the merits and 59 were sustained, for a sustain rate of 13%. This sustain rate is marginally lower than the previous two years where the sustain rates were 15% in both 2021 and 2020. On the other hand, in 2022, GAO’s effectiveness rate—the rate at which GAO sustains a protest or an agency takes voluntary corrective action—was 51%. The 51% effectiveness rate represents an increase from 2021’s 48% and is higher than the average effectiveness rate of 46.75% over the previous four years.
GAO also provided that the most prevalent reasons for sustaining a protest in 2022 were:
- unreasonable technical evaluations;
- flawed selection criteria; and
- flawed solicitations…
This Report shows that 2022 was the fourth straight year that the number of protests filed at GAO decreased. It was also the second year in a row that protests decreased by 12%, marking the largest back-to-back decrease in protests over the past decade. At least part of this continual decrease may be due to the Department of Defense (DOD) implementing enhanced debriefings in 2018, which PilieroMazza previously reported on here. The DOD carries out enhanced debriefings to provide contractors a procedure to better understand where their proposals can be improved. They also allow more time for contractors to make fully informed decisions about filing a protest. The decrease in protests at GAO may also result from contractors opting to protest at the COFC instead, where they are likely to get a more fulsome document production than at GAO… Read the full blog post here.
