The Connolly RAC Dispute – Perspective from MiraVista

BID PROTESTS FOR NATONAL RAC CURRENTLY “DISMISSED”
Columbia, SC, April 9, 2015– In December of 2014, suppliers were alerted that the new national RAC contract for DMEPOS, Home Health and Hospice had been awarded to Connolly, LLC (currently serving as the Jurisdiction C RAC). However, a protest to dispute the contract was filed with the Government Accountability Office (GAO) by the current Jurisdiction A RAC, Performant Recovery Inc. This protest essentially stalled CMS from proceeding with next steps until a decision was reached by the GAO.
While CMS has not directly addressed the status of these bid protests, a search of the GAO bid protest docket shows a total of two bid protests filed by Performant Recovery Inc. The first, B-410999.1 was filed on January 6, 2015 and the second B-410999.2 was filed on February 17, 2015. Both cases have been decided as of February 23, 2015 and are listed with an outcome of dismissed. According to the GAO website, a status of dismissed means that the GAO determined the protest had a technical or procedural flaw (such as lack of timeliness or jurisdiction) or because the agency has taken corrective action that addresses the protest. This status classification likely means that CMS will move forward with the award to Connolly. The other possible statuses are:
 Withdrawn – the protest was removed by the protester
 Denied – the GAO found no merit in the protest, or
 Sustained – the GAO agrees with the argument of the protest.
It is unclear why the protests were dismissed specifically. The GAO website provides little to no information regarding a routine dismissal of a protest. As it stands, we do not have definitive information on next steps. However, we speculate that the contract will proceed with Connolly unless Performant Recovery takes the opportunity to submit another bid protest, if the timeliness of a protest is made viable through the dismissal process.