Federal contractors devote considerable effort to protecting their proprietary pricing information. Labor rates, indirect costs, escalation assumptions, fees, and other pricing inputs can reveal competitive strategies that companies would never voluntarily disclose to rivals.
But what happens when the Government itself discloses competing offerors’ prices during an ongoing procurement?
A recent GAO decision demonstrates that simply providing the same information to everyone does not necessarily restore the integrity of the competition.
In Reliance Test & Technology, B-424203.3 and B-424203.4, decided October 13, 2026, GAO sustained a protest involving the Air Force’s procurement of operations and maintenance services supporting testing and evaluation activities at Eglin Air Force Base and other locations.
The solicitation contemplated a cost-plus-award-fee contract with potential performance extending to ten years.
During discussions, the Air Force inadvertently provided Reliance with a presentation slide showing the total evaluated prices of all three competitors. Reliance notified the agency of the error.
Rather than canceling the procurement or restricting the use of the information, the contracting officer distributed the same pricing information to every offeror, reasoning that equal disclosure would restore competitive fairness.
The agency also permitted offerors to consider that information when preparing final proposal revisions.
What happened next illustrates the problem.
Strategic Test Solutions, the eventual awardee, reduced its proposed cost by approximately $72 million. Reliance reduced its proposed cost by approximately $9 million.
The Air Force investigated and concluded that the winning contractor’s reductions reflected decisions contemplated before the disclosure.
GAO disagreed with the adequacy of that conclusion.
Although the awardee had identified potential areas for cost reductions before receiving the competitors’ pricing information, it had not finalized the amounts. The awardee also acknowledged that it could not determine how much the disclosure influenced its final pricing decisions.
GAO concluded that the agency lacked a reasonable basis for determining that the disclosure had not affected the competition.
Importantly, GAO did not find that the awardee engaged in misconduct or definitively establish that the disclosure caused the $72 million reduction. The problem was the agency’s inability to substantiate its conclusion that the competition remained fair.
The decision offers several practical lessons for contractors.
First, total evaluated prices can be competitively sensitive even when detailed labor rates, overhead, and profit information are not disclosed. Knowing a competitor’s relative pricing position may influence the business judgments underlying a final proposal.
Second, contractors should immediately document any improper disclosure, preserve the relevant communications, and notify the contracting officer. In this case, Reliance promptly reported the disclosure and later objected to the agency’s proposed corrective approach.
Third, contractors should preserve contemporaneous records explaining significant pricing revisions. Internal approvals, cost models, pricing assumptions, and dated decision memoranda can become important evidence when an agency investigates whether competitively sensitive information affected the procurement.
Finally, equal access to improperly disclosed information is not necessarily equivalent to restoring the competitive conditions that existed before disclosure.
GAO recommended that the Air Force reassess the impact and implement effective mitigation, potentially including evaluation of pre-disclosure proposals or resolicitation.
The broader lesson is straightforward.
Procurement integrity is not restored merely because every competitor receives the same information after confidentiality has already been compromised.
For contractors, protecting pricing strategy requires vigilance not only during proposal preparation, but throughout discussions, corrective actions, debriefings, and protests.
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Disclaimer:
This article is provided for general informational and educational purposes only and does not constitute legal, procurement-integrity, pricing, or bid-protest advice. The Reliance decision addresses the particular evidentiary record before GAO and does not establish that every improper disclosure requires cancellation or resolicitation. Contractors should evaluate applicable protest deadlines, confidentiality obligations, competitive prejudice, and available remedies with qualified counsel.