BNUMBER:  B-265869.2
DATE:  March 20, 1996
TITLE:  QuanTech, Inc.

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Matter of:QuanTech, Inc.

File:     B-265869.2

Date:March 20, 1996

Alan M. Grayson, Esq., Victor Kubli, Esq., and Paula K. Goldman, Esq., 
for the protester.
Jerry A. Walz, Esq., Department of Commerce, for the agency.
Charles W. Morrow, Esq., and Guy R. Pietrovito, Esq., Office of the 
General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision.

DIGEST

Procuring agency reasonably reopened the competition to all offerors, 
including an offeror who submitted a late proposal in response to the 
original closing date for receipt of proposals, in response to a 
General Accounting Office decision sustaining a protest and 
recommending an extension of the original proposal closing date. 

DECISION

QuanTech, Inc. protests the determination by the Department of 
Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), to 
reopen the competition under request for proposals (RFP) No. 
50-DGNF-5-00079, issued to obtain a contractor to conduct the agency's 
1996 "National Marine Fishery Statistics Survey."

We deny the protest.

As issued, the RFP provided that certain necessary proposal 
preparation material would be available upon request.  Although Marine 
Research Specialists (MRS) timely requested this information, NOAA did 
not furnish it to MRS until shortly before the scheduled closing date; 
NOAA, however, did timely furnish the information to other potential 
offerors.  Also, NOAA denied MRS's request for an extension of the 
closing date.  In Marine Research Specialists, B-265869, Jan. 2, 1996, 
96-1 CPD  para.  1, we sustained MRS's protest of the agency's failure to 
timely provide the information, because we found that MRS and the 
other offerors were treated unequally and that the agency had failed 
to obtain full and open competition by refusing to extend the RFP's 
closing date.  We recommended that NOAA establish a new closing date 
and allow MRS to submit a proposal.

In response to our decision and recommendation, NOAA decided to reopen 
the competition to all offerors, including MRS.  The RFP was amended 
to establish a new closing date of February 12, 1996, for the receipt 
of proposals.  On that date, NOAA received proposals from the firms, 
including QuanTech, that initially had submitted timely proposals by 
the original closing date, as well as from a firm that had not 
previously submitted a proposal and a firm whose proposal had earlier 
been rejected as late.

QuanTech objects to allowing other offerors, besides MRS, to submit 
proposals by the new closing date for receipt of proposals, arguing 
that our protest decision only recommended allowing MRS to submit a 
proposal.  In QuanTech's view, our recommendation was intended to cure 
an impropriety that affected only MRS, and not other offerors.  
QuanTech complains that one of the new offers is from a firm that was 
previously determined to be late under the original closing date, and 
that consideration of this offer unfairly permits the firm to 
circumvent the RFP's late proposal clause.  

The details of implementing our protest recommendations for corrective 
action are within the sound discretion and judgment of the contracting 
agency.  OMNI Int'l Distribs., Inc., 67 Comp. Gen. 123 (1987), 87-2 
CPD  para.  563.  We will not question an agency's ultimate manner of 
compliance, so long as it remedies the procurement impropriety that 
was the basis for the decision's recommendation.  Serv-Air, Inc., 
B-258243.4, Mar. 3, 1995, 95-1 CPD  para.  125.  

The procurement impropriety that we recommended NOAA remedy included 
the agency's unreasonable failure to extend the closing date for the 
initial competition; NOAA's setting of a new closing date cured that 
impropriety consistent with our protest recommendation.  Moreover, the 
Competition in Contracting Act of 1984, 41 U.S.C.  sec.  253(a)(1)(A) 
(1994), directs contracting agencies to obtain full and open 
competition, and the agency's decision to allow other firms to join 
the competition by the new closing date was consistent with that 
mandate as well.  Also, there is no evidence that the protester, or 
any other offeror, was prejudiced by allowing firms to compete; 
rather, all offerors will have an equal opportunity to compete for 
award. 

To the extent that QuanTech seeks to limit the competition solely to 
gain the benefit of a reduced competition, we note that the objective 
of our Office is to insure full and open competition for government 
contracts.  Accordingly, our Office generally will not review a 
protest that has the explicit or implicit purpose of reducing 
competition so that a protester may become the beneficiary of a more 
restrictive procurement.  See Ingersoll-Rand Co., B-224706; B-224849, 
Dec. 22, 1986, 86-2 CPD  para.  701.

The protest is denied.

Comptroller General
of the United States