DOD Proposes to Formally Implement Enhanced Debriefings
DOD Proposes to Formally Implement Enhanced Debriefings
James Tucker spoke to Law360 about the U.S. Department of Defense’s (DOD) proposal to give unsuccessful bidders on many defense contracts the right to more information about why their bid was not chosen, expanding and codifying an existing interim policy.
According to James, the beefed-up DOD debriefing process has at least anecdotally served to cut down on bid protests, following previous complaints about sparse debriefings that left come contract bidders feeling as if they had to protest to get answers to why their bid was not chosen.
“We’ve seen robust enhanced debriefings convince disappointed offerers to stand down from a pending decision to protest once they see that they lost a competition fair and square,” James said. “We’ve also seen agencies take corrective action without a protest when enhanced debriefings bring procurement errors to light. And greater transparency tends to bring a greater confidence in the reliability of the federal procurement process.”
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