The solicitation for work to improve, operate and maintain a wastewater treatment facility contemplated award of a fixed-price contract for improvements and two option items.  An amendment to the solicitation provided the contractor would be responsible for operation and maintenance of the facility “from the effective date of the notice to proceed of the Base Item until 3 months after final acceptance by the contracting officer.”  Integrated acknowledged receipt of the amendment but in its cover letter to the bid it stated “operation of the plant is included for duration of the construction project until 3 months after substantial completion.”  Due to the wording in the cover letter, the government rejected Integrated’s bid as “non-responsive” asserting the cover letter’s qualification made the bid ambiguous because it was uncertain whether the bidder unequivocally offered to perform in accordance with stated terms.  The Comp. Gen. agreed with the government noting that to be responsive “a bid must contain an unequivocal offer to perform” the exact thing called out in the solicitation.  If in its bid – including its bid cover letter – a bidder conditions or modifies a material requirement, limits its liability to the government or limits the rights of the government under a resulting contract “then the bid must be rejected as non-responsive.”  Also, the Comp. Gen. added that a non-responsive bid cannot be made responsible through post-bid-opening clarifications and mistake-in-bid procedures may not be used to make the bid responsive (Oregon elect Construction, DBA Integrated System Group, Comp. Gen. Dec. B-294279).

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