GAO Releases FY 2024 Bid Protest Statistics

In November 2024, consistent with the Competition in Contracting Act of 1984 (CICA), the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released its annual report to congressional committees highlighting key bid protest statistics and high-level insights into GAO’s bid protest–related activities. 

Several trends in bid protests are noted based on GAO’s annual report. In FY 2024, GAO received a total of 1,803 cases filed: 1,740 protests, 33 cost claims, and 30 requests for reconsideration. This year’s total number of cases shows an 11 percent decrease from FY 2023, when 2,025 cases were recorded. However, the 2023 figure is skewed by an unusually high number of protests regarding Chief Information Officer–Solutions and Partners 4 (CIO-SP4) information technology (IT) services contracts. The 1,803 cases filed in FY 2024 falls near the five-year average of 1,904 cases. 

During the year, GAO closed 1,706 cases. Similar to FY 2023, many closed cases were due to GAO’s bid protest jurisdiction over task orders placed under indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) contracts. 

GAO also highlighted a 16 percent sustainment rate, down from 31 percent in the previous year. Sustainment occurs when GAO agrees with the protester that the agency violated a procurement law or regulation in a prejudicial manner. The most prevalent reasons for sustaining protests in FY 2024 involved unreasonable technical evaluations, flawed selection decisions, and unreasonable cost or price evaluations. The chart below summarizes the number of cases filed and the sustainment rate percentage by year. Once again, the significant drop in the sustainment rate is distorted by the outlier from fiscal year 2023. When disregarding this outlier, the sustainment rate appears to be holding steady. 

The effectiveness rate is another vital statistic that measures the percentage of cases in which a protestor receives some form of relief from the agency, whether through voluntary corrective action or the GAO sustaining the protest. FY 2024’s rate (52 percent) marked the third consecutive year that it has been above 50 percent. This illustrates how procuring agencies are often willing to take corrective action in response to errors raised during the bid protest process. 

Overall, the decreases in the number of cases filed, cases closed, and sustainment rate can be attributed to the significant outlier year in FY 2023 related to the CIO-SP4 IT services contracts protests. The statistics remain consistent when excluding this large outlier. Viewing these statistics collectively indicates that filing a bid protest through GAO remains a viable, effective, and frequently utilized method for addressing agency procurement errors. 

Find GAO Bid Protest Report here: GAO Bid Protest Annual Report to Congress for Fiscal Year 2024