BNUMBER: B-276659.2
DATE: September 29, 1997
TITLE: MCI Telecommunications Corporation, B-276659.2, September 29,
1997
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DOCUMENT FOR PUBLIC RELEASE
A protected decision was issued on the date below and was subject to a
GAO Protective Order. This version has been redacted or approved by
the parties involved for public release.
Matter of:MCI Telecommunications Corporation
File: B-276659.2
Date:September 29, 1997
Thomas C. Wheeler, Esq., and Kevin P. Mullen, Esq., Piper & Marbury,
and Robin L. Redfield, Esq., MCI Telecommunications Corporation, for
the protester.
Thomas C. Papson, Esq., and C. Stanley Dees, Esq., McKenna & Cuneo,
and Nathaniel Friends, Esq., and Robert L. Petersen, Jr., Esq., for
AT&T Communications, Inc., an intervenor.
Michelle Harrell, Esq., General Services Administration, for the
agency.
Ralph O. White, Esq., and Christine S. Melody, Esq., Office of the
General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision.
DIGEST
Modification of dedicated transmission services portion of the
contract by which the federal government purchases domestic inter-city
telecommunications services to add an option permitting the contractor
to design, operate, and maintain custom dedicated networks for
government agencies is beyond the scope of the original
telecommunications services contract and must be purchased in
accordance with the statutory requirements for competition.
DECISION
MCI Telecommunications Corporation protests a decision by the General
Services Administration (GSA) to modify the FTS 2000 contract held by
AT&T Communications, Inc. MCI maintains that the Network Service
Assurance Plan II (NSAP II), added by modification PS273 to the
dedicated transmission service portion of AT&T's contract, exceeds the
scope of the original FTS 2000 contract. Thus, MCI argues that GSA
was required to hold a competition for these services.
We sustain the protest.
BACKGROUND
On December 31, 1986, GSA issued request for proposals (RFP) No.
KET-JW-87-02 seeking offers to replace the existing Federal
Telecommunications System and to provide all of the federal
government's domestic inter-city telecommunications services for a
10-year period. The resulting contract became known as the FTS 2000
contract, and is the largest acquisition ever undertaken by a civilian
federal agency.[1]
The RFP for the FTS 2000 contract set forth six types of services
covered by the procurement: (1) switched voice service, (2) switched
data service, (3) switched digital integrated service, (4) packet
switched service, (5) video transmission service, and (6) dedicated
transmission service. RFP sec. C.1.3.1. Dedicated transmission
service--the service affected by the modification at issue here--was
defined in the solicitation as "point-to-point private line
transmission of voice and data." RFP sec. C.2.1.1. In essence, this
means that the transmission capacity is reserved for the user,
available at all times, and always connected to the same party at the
other end of the line. In addition, the RFP explained that "dedicated
transmission service includes analog, digital, and T1 transmission
service." RFP sec. C.2.7. These services "differ primarily in their
transmission rates." AT&T Communications, Inc. v. Wiltel, Inc., 1
F.3d 1201, 1203 (Fed. Cir. 1993).
Three offerors responded to GSA's original RFP: Sprint, Martin
Marietta (with MCI as a subcontractor), and AT&T. At the conclusion
of the competition, on December 7, 1988, GSA made two awards: Network
A, covering 60 percent of federal domestic inter-city service, was
awarded to AT&T; Network B, covering the remaining 40 percent of
inter-city service, was awarded to Sprint. Both contracts are
indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity contracts, and both permit
federal agencies to order the same comprehensive set of
telecommunications services. The maximum value of the Network A
contract is $15 billion; the maximum value of the Network B contract
is $10 billion.[2] The protest here is limited to AT&T's Network A
contract.
Over the life of the FTS 2000 contract, the growth of computer
networks has triggered significant growth in the use, speed, and
sophistication of dedicated transmission services. Since the RFP
anticipated advances in commercial service and required the contractor
to provide these same advances to the government, RFP sec. C.2.1.8, there
have been numerous modifications to the contract. Two major
modifications to the dedicated transmission services portion of the
FTS 2000 contract--the addition of multipoint service and T3
transmission capability--triggered legal disputes resulting in
opinions discussed in detail later in this decision.
The NSAP II Modification
The work added by the June 13, 1997, NSAP II modification to the FTS
2000 contract is set forth in the modification at paragraph E,
including sub-paragraphs E.1 through E.7, on pages 2 through 6. As
shown in detail below, the general thrust of this modification is to
permit AT&T to design and maintain customized dedicated networks for
agencies.
The text of the modification anticipates that federal government
customers will order NSAP II using a request for service form, on
which they will specify the parameters of the service desired. Mod. sec.
E.4. The form, attached to the modification as Appendix 00.1, allows
customers to indicate their preferred transmission protocol (choices
are: internet protocol, multicast internet protocol, DECNET, ATM, or
TDM). Customers also specify their traffic and performance
requirements. Under traffic, which is specified in bandwidth (bits
per second) or throughput (packets per second), customers specify the
average, peak, burst duration, busy hour, and average packet size (in
bytes) of their transmission traffic. Under performance, customers
specify their requirements for availability, time to restore service
(mean time and maximum time), lost packet rate, packet group delay,
and packet group delay variance. Customers may also specify their
needs for AT&T engineers and technicians to be available on-site.
Using this information, the modification anticipates that the
contractor will submit a design, in the form of a quote for service,
to meet the customer's individual networking needs, and identify the
equipment needed to accomplish the task.[3] Mod. sec. E.4. In addition,
the contractor will assemble the network, including "operations,
administration, maintenance and network management services." Mod. sec.
E.5. Further, the contractor will "provide sustaining engineering to
oversee the ongoing growth, network design, and life cycle engineering
of the NSAP II network services in meeting the customer's evolving
requirements." Mod. sec. E.5.2. Included within these services, the
contractor will be responsible for providing network security, such as
risk assessment, illegal entry prevention measures, acceptable use
policy, and authentication and privacy. Mod. sec. E.5.4. For example,
the change pages to the contract's technical manual (identified on
pages 8 and 9 of the modification, and appended to the text of the
modification) show that the contractor will design and provide
security firewalls for agencies as part of these services. Revised
Contract Page 5.1.7-29.
With the purchase of NSAP II service, government agencies will be able
to specify enhanced performance above the levels in the basic FTS 2000
service. For example, the table below shows the current performance
parameters of FTS 2000 service (amended several times since original
contract award) compared to the maximum performance levels available
under NSAP II[4]:
PERFORMANCE
FEATURES CURRENT
FTS 2000 NSAP II
MODIFICATION
Availability 99.87 percent up to 99.98 percent
Trouble Identification
Time less than
2 hours up to less than
1 minute
Time to Repair/Restore
Service less than 4 hours
mean time to repair up to less than
1 minute to restore
Error Rate AT&T commercial
practice up to 1 x 10-6 lost packet
rate for a 100 byte pckt.
Although agencies are able to purchase increases in performance with
NSAP II services, as shown above, and although GSA and AT&T claim that
the purpose of this modification is to enhance performance, the
modification clearly permits the purchase of network design and
maintenance services regardless of whether doing so increases
transmission reliability.[5] In fact, during the course of the
hearing on this protest, AT&T testified that there was no requirement
to purchase performance above the levels of the standard FTS 2000
contract, and that AT&T intended to market these services to agencies
whose performance requirements are not as stringent as the maximums
specified in the modification. Tr. at 271-272. Thus, we find that
there is no per se requirement to increase transmission reliability as
part of the purchase of network design and maintenance services
offered in this modification to the contract.
Chronology of the Dispute Regarding NSAP II
GSA explains that since 1994 there has been "an explosion of data
networking" placing a burden on agencies faced with integrating and
selecting the appropriate transmission approach for dedicated
networks. Tr. at 75, 84. In addition, the record shows that GSA and
AT&T had been discussing ways to provide technical assistance to
agencies with their dedicated networks, and also discussing ways to
address higher reliability requirements for certain government
networks, such as NASA's requirements for its Earth Observing Systems
Data Information Systems Backbone Network (Ebnet), which provides
wide-area communications and facilities between NASA ground stations.
Tr. at 84; Contracting Officer's Statement, July 23, 1997, at 5.
These discussions led to a decision to add the NSAP II services,
described above, to AT&T's FTS 2000 contract.
MCI learned of the discussions, and of GSA's intent to modify the FTS
2000 contract, via a segment of NASA's Internet Web Page providing an
overview of the Ebnet project. MCI apparently asked GSA to keep it
informed of the agency's actions, and the record shows that GSA
provided notice of its intent to proceed with the modification on
February 13, 1997. MCI challenged the scope of the modification--as
it understood it--in an agency-level protest filed on February 20. On
March 24, MCI's agency-level protest was sustained in part and denied
in part.
On April 2, MCI filed a protest with our Office challenging both the
proposed remedy for the sustained portions of its agency-level
protest, and the portions of the decision denying its protest. On
April 14, our Office dismissed the protest without prejudice pursuant
to an agreement between the parties under which GSA would review its
actions and advise MCI of the agency's intended approach.
On June 13, GSA notified MCI that it was executing modification number
PS273 to AT&T's FTS 2000 contract, and on June 20, MCI reinstated its
protest here. MCI's June 20 protest incorporated by reference its
April 2 protest, and added one additional protest ground. On June 30,
GSA provided MCI with the core documents related to the modification
pursuant to the terms of a protective order issued by our Office.
This was the first opportunity MCI had to review any of the documents
related to this issue, including the text of the modification, the
agency in-scope determination, and the contracting officer's statement
and AT&T's response to MCI's agency-level protest.
DISCUSSION
Procedural Issue
GSA requests dismissal of MCI's complaint, claiming that it fails to
state a valid basis for protest and, alternatively, that the issues
MCI raises are untimely. AT&T joins the agency in this request. We
disagree on both counts.
GSA argues that since MCI did not have a copy of the modification
until June 30, MCI's protest was necessarily based on "information and
belief" and not the facts of the procurement. Although GSA does not
contend that the protest filed with our Office was initially
insufficient to challenge the procurement, it argues that MCI was
required to amend its protest after receiving the text of the
modification and the other related documents to more accurately
reflect the details of the modification, and more clearly reflect
MCI's concerns. Since the protest was not amended after receipt of
the documents, GSA urges that it be dismissed. Alternatively, GSA
urges that any specific challenges to the modification not expressly
mentioned in the initial filings be considered untimely at this
juncture. MCI answers that it was not required to amend its protest
because its review of the modification documents confirmed its
challenge as already filed.
Our Office will dismiss a protest which lacks a detailed statement of
the factual and legal grounds for challenging a procurement, or which
fails to state legally sufficient grounds of protest. 4 C.F.R. sec.
21.5(f) (1997). In this regard, we have explained that a protester's
allegation of a procurement impropriety, without an explanation of how
the procurement was flawed, is insufficient to support a bid protest.
Federal Computer Int'l Corp.--Recon., B-257618.2, July 14, 1994, 94-2
CPD para. 24 at 2.
Our review of MCI's protest filings shows that the April 2 filing
raises six specific challenges to the scope of the NSAP II
modification and that the June 20 filing incorporates the challenges
raised in April and adds one more. While certain of MCI's issues were
addressed between the April 2 filing and the June 20 filing--for
example, after GSA sustained MCI's agency-level protest claim that the
NSAP II modification improperly permitted the purchase of network
hardware from AT&T for the first time since the award of the FTS 2000
contract, the purchase authority was deleted from the
modification--other contentions continued to accurately reflect MCI's
view of the procurement. In this regard, we note that the April 2
protest argues that the modification will permit AT&T
[t]o become a single point of contact for change, fault,
performance, accounting and security management. These types of
management services go well beyond what is contemplated under the
FTS 2000 contracts, and are not merely incidental to providing
the telecommunications services.
. . . . .
[t]o provide a centralized Network Management System in which
AT&T will have total responsibility for all NASA equipment and
circuits, and become the single point of contact for all NASA
network modifications. There is nothing comparable to this
sweeping scope of work under the FTS 2000 contracts.
MCI Initial Protest, April 2, 1997, at 3-4 (emphasis in original).
While we agree with the agency that the better practice would have
been for MCI to amend its protest to more precisely reflect the issues
remaining in dispute after reviewing the actual text of the
modification, we do not think it was required to do so in this case,
given that the April 2 filing, in most respects, continued to
accurately reflect MCI's concerns about this procurement. In fact,
the protest was sufficient to permit the agency to prepare a response
in defense of its actions. With respect to the alternative contention
that any detailed grounds of protest about the modification first
raised in MCI's comments should be considered untimely because they
were not raised within 10 days of MCI's review of the modification
documents, see 4 C.F.R. sec. 21.2(a)(2), we view the initial allegations
as sufficiently detailed to cover the arguments subsequently
developed. As a result, we will consider the merits of MCI's protest.
Standard of Review
The Competition in Contracting Act (CICA) requires "full and open
competition" in government procurements as obtained through the use of
competitive procedures. 41 U.S.C. sec. 253(a)(1)(A) (1994). Once a
contract is awarded, however, our Office will generally not review
modifications to that contract, because such matters are related to
contract administration and are beyond the scope of our bid protest
function. 4 C.F.R. sec. 21.5(a); Stoehner Security Servs., Inc.,
B-248077.3, Oct. 27, 1992, 92-2 CPD para. 285 at 4. The exception to this
rule is where it is alleged that a contract modification is beyond the
scope of the original contract, since the work covered by the
modification would otherwise be subject to the statutory requirements
for competition (absent a valid determination that the work is
appropriate for procurement on a sole-source basis). Neil R. Gross &
Co., Inc., 69 Comp. Gen. 292, 294 (1990), 90-1 CPD para. 212 at 2, aff'd,
The Dept. of Labor--Recon., B-237434.2, May 22, 1990, 90-1 CPD para. 491.
In determining whether a modification triggers the competition
requirements in CICA, we look to whether there is a material
difference between the modified contract and the contract that was
originally awarded. Neil R. Gross & Co., Inc., supra, 90-1 CPD para. 212
at 2-3; see AT&T Communications, Inc. v. Wiltel, Inc., supra, at 1205.
Evidence of a material difference between the modification and the
original contract is found by examining any changes in the type of
work, performance period, and costs between the contract as awarded
and as modified. Neil R. Gross & Co., Inc., supra, 90-1 CPD para. 212 at
3. We also consider whether the solicitation for the original
contract adequately advised offerors of the potential for the type of
change found in the modification, CAD Language Sys., Inc., B-233709,
Apr. 3, 1989, 89-1 CPD para. 342 at 4, or whether the modification is of a
nature which potential offerors would reasonably have anticipated at
the time of the original award. American Air Filter Co.--DLA Request
for Recon., 57 Comp. Gen. 567, 573 (1978), 78-1 CPD para. 443 at 9-10.
The Scope of FTS 2000
At the outset, we recognize the broad nature of the FTS 2000 contract
and that the competitors for the contract clearly contemplated that
extensive modifications would be made to the contract over its 10-year
life. AT&T Communications, Inc. v. Wiltel, Inc., supra. On its face,
the RFP explained that the procurement was designed to permit the
government "[t]o obtain a comprehensive set of telecommunications
services" and "[t]o obtain telecommunications services through two
prime service contractors responsible for providing all services and
network management." RFP sec. C.1.3. To achieve these objectives, the
RFP explains:
The government intends to procure the following six
telecommunications services: switched voice service, switched
data service, switched digital integrated service, packet
switched service, video transmission service, and dedicated
transmission service. This solicitation describes these
services, as well as specific features of these services that the
government is likely to procure. It is the government's intent
that these services conform as closely as possible with those
offered commercially.
RFP sec. C.1.3.1 (emphasis added).
In addition, the solicitation's expansive Service Improvements clause
advised offerors that after award:
the Government may solicit, and the Contractor is encouraged to
propose independently, improvements to the services, features, or
other requirements of the contract. These improvements may be
proposed to save money, to improve performance, or for any other
purpose which presents a service advantage to the Government.
RFP sec. H.16.
Despite the broad nature of this contract, however, we do not agree
that the kind of networking services at issue here reasonably fall
within the scope of the original FTS 2000 contract. Our reasons for
this conclusion are set forth below.
Focusing first on the type of work at issue, the discussion above
shows that the original FTS 2000 contract purchased telecommunications
services, and for purposes of this review, dedicated transmission
services. RFP sec. C.1.3; C.1.3.1. Under the FTS 2000 contract, as
awarded, transmission services ended at a government facility's
"service delivery point." RFP sec. C.2.1.7. Beyond this point (or in
some cases a "secondary service delivery point"), a facility's network
was not the responsibility of the telephone services contractor.[6]
Id.
In contrast, the kind of effort purchased by the NSAP II modification
is described in common industry parlance as "network outsourcing."
Outsourcing of an entity's network design and management is a business
not traditionally performed by the companies that provide transmission
services like those purchased under the FTS 2000 contracts. For
example, a list of the "Top 10 Network Outsourcing Vendors" published
in a leading trade magazine and appended to MCI's Comments on the
Agency Report, identifies companies like Hewlett-Packard, Computer
Sciences Corporation, and I-NET.[7] In addition, network outsourcing
can generally be purchased without regard to any changes in dedicated
transmission capabilities.
While the type of work purchased by the NSAP II modification is
different from dedicated transmission services as procured to date, we
recognize that there is some ambiguity about whether the original FTS
2000 contract anticipated that the contractors would perform some
network management services. Specifically, the RFP states that one
purpose of the FTS 2000 contract is to procure from two contractors
all of the government's telecommunication "services and network
management." RFP sec. C.1.3.
In our view, however, the term "network management" as used in the
original FTS 2000 contract has a different meaning from the term as
used in the NSAP II modification. As the court pointed out in
reversing the GSA Board of Contract Appeals's Wiltel decision
(discussed further below), certain of the terms used in the FTS 2000
contract have more than one meaning. See AT&T Communications, Inc. v.
Wiltel, Inc., supra, at 1206-1207 ("The Board erred in assuming that
the term 'service' has one and the same meaning in various contexts.
To the contrary, the FTS 2000 contract uses 'service' in many distinct
ways.").
The original management requirements for the FTS 2000 contracts were
identified at RFP sec. C.3, entitled "Management and Operations." Within
this section, 12 functional management tasks are identified, one of
which is entitled "network operations and management." RFP sec. C.3.1.3.
In the section describing network operations and management, the RFP
identifies service continuity, and "the development and execution of
restoration and contingency plans covering the loss of facilities or
switching capabilities, network overload, and other service-disrupting
conditions." RFP sec. C.3.2.5. None of these services, however, cross
the threshold from the publicly available transmission network, into
an agency's "private" network. Under NSAP II, however, AT&T's network
management will move from managing its own assets--i.e, its domestic,
inter-city long distance calling network--to designing and managing
customized agency networks for conducting federal government business.
Mod. sec. E.5; see Tr. at 90. Thus, we conclude that, notwithstanding
the use of the term "network management," the type of work performed
under the modification is different from the work procured under the
original contract.
We next consider the cost of the NSAP II service and the performance
period involved for these services. Currently, NASA is the only
agency that has placed orders against AT&T's FTS 2000 contract for
NSAP II service. As a result, GSA has estimated the cost of NSAP II
as $7.8 million. On the other hand, several factors lead us to
conclude that the relatively small cost estimate for NSAP II services
should not control our determination of whether the modification is
within the scope of the original contract.
For example, AT&T's technical representative stated during our hearing
on this protest that the company intends to market this service
throughout the government to agencies that may not need increased
reliability, but would like to purchase assistance with network design
and maintenance--i.e., outsourcing. Tr. at 271. If AT&T is
successful in its efforts, the value of this modification could be
significantly higher than GSA's current estimate. In addition, we
reject GSA's contention that this modification occurs so late in the
10-year life of the FTS 2000 contract that it is unlikely that enough
purchasers will order the service to cause the modification's value to
become a significant portion of the overall cost of the original
contract. Clearly, the opportunity to design, choose equipment for,
and manage an agency's communication network could have value--and
opportunities for extended performance--beyond the life of the FTS
2000 contract.
In sum, in light of the significant difference in the type of services
to be performed under the NSAP II modification, we conclude that the
modification is outside the scope of the original contract.
Finally--and as an overlay to the analysis above--we review this
modification with an eye to the two prior legal disputes in which MCI
alleged that modifications to the contract's dedicated transmission
services exceeded the scope of the original contract.
In 1992, AT&T's FTS 2000 contract was amended to add multipoint
service to the contract's dedicated transmission service. MCI's
challenge to the addition of this service was considered and denied in
MCI Telecommunications Corp. v. General Servs. Admin., GSBCA No.
11963-P, 93-1 BCA para. 25,541, 1992 BPD para. 287. While the original RFP
described dedicated transmission service as "point-to-point private
line transmission of voice and data," RFP sec. C.2.1.1., multipoint
service is used to link three or more locations together on a single
dedicated circuit. MCI, 93-1 BCA at 127,219, 1992 BPD para. 287 at 9.
The GSA Board concluded that multipoint service was a foreseeable
improvement to dedicated transmission services, and was well within
the scope of the original contract. Id. at 127,222, 1992 BPD para. 287 at
14.
Also in 1992, AT&T's contract was amended to add T3 transmission
service to the dedicated transmission portion of the FTS 2000
contract. The GSA Board sustained a challenge to this modification
filed by Wiltel, Inc. (with MCI as an intervenor). Wiltel, Inc. v.
General Services Admin., GSBCA No. 11857-P, 93-1 BCA para. 25,314, 1992
BPD para. 201. The T3 service considered in Wiltel uses fiber-optic cable
to transmit dedicated data and voice signals at a rate of 45 million
bits per second, approximately 28 times faster than the T1
transmission rate (the rate identified in the original contract) and
672 times faster than a voice grade circuit. Id. at 126,104, 126,106,
1992 BPD para. 201 at 2, 5; Tr. at 34. Since the GSA Board considered T3
service a new service, as opposed to an improvement to an existing
service, it concluded that the modification adding the service
violated the scope of the original FTS 2000 contract. Wiltel, 93-1
BCA at 126,113, 1992 BPD para. 201 at 19-20.
The GSA Board's Wiltel decision on T3 transmission service was
reversed by the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal
Circuit. AT&T Communications, Inc. v. Wiltel, Inc., supra. The court
concluded that the GSA Board erred in focusing on the differences
between T1 and T3 service, and should have instead recognized that T3
service was an improvement to dedicated transmission service. Id. at
1207. Thus, the court considered the addition of T3 transmission
services to be within the scope of the original FTS 2000 contract.
Id.
The network design and management services purchased under NSAP II are
distinguishable from the services procured in these earlier
modifications. Both multipoint transmission and T3 transmission were
technological improvements to dedicated transmission services, and as
such, were anticipated by the FTS 2000 contract's stated intention of
remaining current with developing technology. By comparison, while it
is clear that an entity can obtain improvements in reliability by
redesigning its network, the design, maintenance, and operation of a
customized data network for agency-specific use is a distinctly
different effort from improving the reliability of the transmission
service connecting it. In short, the ability to improve reliability
through better networking cannot reasonably be termed an improvement
in dedicated transmission.
RECOMMENDATION
We conclude that the modification to the FTS 2000 contract adding NSAP
II services is beyond the scope of the original contract, and that GSA
was required to procure these services in accordance with the
competition requirements of CICA, 41 U.S.C. sec. 253(a). Accordingly, we
recommend that GSA terminate the NSAP II services added to the FTS
2000 contract pursuant to modification number PS273, and either hold a
competition for these services or prepare the appropriate
justification required by CICA for a sole-source procurement.[8]
We also recommend that the protester be reimbursed the reasonable
costs of filing and pursuing its protest including attorneys' fees. 4
C.F.R. sec. 21.8(d)(1). In accordance with 4 C.F.R. sec. 21.8(f)(1), MCI's
certified claim for such costs, detailing the time expended and the
costs incurred, must be submitted directly to the agency within 60
days after receipt of this decision.
The protest is sustained.
Comptroller General
of the United States
1. Staff of House Committee on Government Operations, FTS 2000:
Management Reforms and Intensive Congressional Oversight Ensure
Savings of $500 Million for the Taxpayers, H.R. Doc. No. 102-1056 at 2
(1992).
2. Despite the magnitude of these contracts, their value does not
represent the majority of federal spending on telecommunications
services. During fiscal year 1995, the General Accounting Office
concluded that the federal government spent at least $2.4 billion on
telecommunication services, of which 32 percent, or $761 million, was
spent via the FTS 2000 contracts. GAO, Telecommunications Costs
Reported by Federal Organizations for Fiscal Year 1995 at 2, 5
(AIMD-96-105, B-271967, June 17, 1996); Hearing Transcript (Tr.) at
209-210.
3. In response to MCI's earlier agency-level protest of this
modification, discussed in greater detail below, which GSA sustained
in part and denied in part, the equipment identified by the contractor
will be provided as government furnished equipment (GFE).
4. The stringency of the maximum performance parameters available in
the NSAP II modification have been designed to meet certain unique
requirements related to the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration (NASA). Since NASA was involved in developing the
performance requirements, it is the first agency to have placed an
order for NSAP II services. To date, no other agency has ordered the
NSAP II services.
5. For example, on the request for service form, described above,
government customers may specify any level of availability between the
current FTS 2000 standard of 99.87 percent and the NSAP II ceiling of
99.98 percent. Modification, Appendix 00.1, at fourth unnumbered
page.
6. This distinction is also present in home telephone service.
Generally, without the purchase of an additional service, the
telephone company's responsibility for wiring does not extend beyond
the point where the telephone lines enter the home.
7. For the record, however, the list also includes AT&T Solutions and
MCI/SHL.
8. During the course of this protest, GSA determined that it was in
the best interests of the government to continue performance
notwithstanding the protest and executed a "best interest" override of
the statutory stay of AT&T's performance of this modification to the
contract. See 31 U.S.C. sec. 3553(d)(3)(C)(i)(I) (1994). In such cases,
CICA requires our Office to make our recommendation "without regard to
any cost or disruption from terminating, recompeting, or reawarding
the contract." 31 U.S.C. sec. 3554(b)(2).