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Cost Disallowance Claim Accrued When the Government Paid Invoices

Client Alert | 1 min read | 09.11.18

In United Liquid Gas Co. v. GSA (July 12, 2018), the Civilian Board of Contract Appeals found that the government’s cost disallowance claim was untimely under the Contract Disputes Act’s six-year statute of limitations. Following an audit, GSA filed a $3.3 million claim alleging that the contractor overbilled GSA on a fixed-price per gallon propane contract. The Board held that GSA’s claim began to accrue on the date that the Government paid each invoice. GSA argued unsuccessfully that, before the audit, it could not have known of the overbilling because the invoices were paid by a separate agency (the Defense Finance and Accounting Service). The Board responded that GSA was “obligated to monitor [the] payments” and thus “should have known about the overpayment[s].” Because each invoice payment was treated as a separate event for claim accrual purposes, the Board denied as time-barred roughly $280,000 of GSA’s claim that involved payments more than six years before the claim was filed.

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Client Alert | 3 min read | 07.10.26

Federal Circuit Clarifies Application of Blue & Gold: Proposal Submission Deadline, Not Award, is the Operative Time for Filing

In Utech, Inc. v. United States, No. 24-1586 (Fed. Cir. June 24, 2026), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit clarified that in most cases, a pre-award protest must be filed before the proposal submission deadline to avoid the Blue & Gold waiver rule.  This decision, while nonprecedential, is in line with U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) precedent, which has long held that pre-award protests must be filed before the proposal submission deadline....