230 Ct. Cl. 884 | Ct. Cl. | 1982
Plaintiff, Paragon Energy Corporation (Paragon), petitions for a contract adjustment and monetary compensation for its unilateral bid mistake based upon clerical error. The
The essential facts upon which plaintiffs claim is founded are as follows. On September 21, 1978, under its former name, Paragon Mechanical, Inc., Paragon submitted a single figure bid and on September 29, 1978, was awarded a contract, through formal advertising and competitive bidding, to perform heating, ventilating, and air conditioning work at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, for the Army Corps of Engineers.
Plaintiffs bid was based upon calculations contained on its bid take-off sheet for its various items of costs, including labor, materials, etc., and profit. Its calculation of $30,474 for sheet metal was inadvertently omitted from the calculation of its total job cost. This clerical error was not discovered until after the contract was awarded. Notification and request for adjustment was contained in a letter from Paragon to the contracting officer, dated January 11, 1979.
Plaintiffs bid was for $214,800. The next lowest bid was for $249,300, and a third bid was for $345,879. Prior to the award, the Government had obtained from an architectural-engineering firm an estimate of $217,080 as the job cost. Since plaintiffs bid was less than the estimate, the Government followed a normal procedure of contacting the contractor and asking if the contractor had reviewed the bid and was satisfied with it. Plaintiff affirmed on both questions. Mr. Lunsford, who telephoned plaintiff, did not indicate that the Government suspected error, and, in fact, error was not suspected.
In its letter of January 11,1979, plaintiff noted that, even with the cost of sheet metal included, its bid was less than the next lowest bid. However, the facts are clear in this case
As we said in Chernick:
[P]laintiffs may recover only if defendant’s responsible officials knew or should have known of the mistake at the time the bid was accepted. The test of what an official in charge of accepting bids "should” have known-must be that of reasonableness, i.e., whether under the facts and circumstances of the case there were any factors which reasonably should have raised the presumption of error in the mind of the contracting officer; among such factors are obvious wide range of bids, and gross disparity between the price bid and the value of the article which was the subject of the bid. * * *
There is an obvious wide disparity in the bids here, but this factor alone is not determinative.
Plaintiffs reliance upon Metro Novelty Manufacturing Co.
We have considered the other arguments made by plaintiff, and find them to be without merit.
it is therefore ordered, after hearing oral argument, that defendant’s motion for summary judgment is granted, plaintiffs cross-motion for summary judgment is denied, and the petition is dismissed.
Paragon Energy Corp. v. United States, 227 Ct. Cl. 176, 645 F.2d 966 (1981).
41 U.S.C. §§601 etseq. (Supp II 1978).
Chernick v. United States, 178 Ct. Cl. 498, 504, 372 F.2d 492, 496 (1967).
See Aydin Corp. v. United States, 229 Ct. Cl. 309, 314-16, 669 F.2d 681, 686-87 (1982).
United States v. Metro Novelty Mfg. Co., 125 F.Supp. 713 (S.D.N.Y. 1954).