An REA By Another Name ... Is Sometimes A Claim?

Last month, the Civilian Board of Contract Appeals (CBCA) confirmed that both the courts and boards of contract appeals are increasingly willing to look beyond the surface of a claim that starts an appeal for the purposes of establishing jurisdiction before them. On Nov. 22, 2024, the CBCA found that it had the jurisdiction to review the ELA Group, Inc.'s challenge of a Department of Labor's (DOL) Contracting Officer's (CO's) decision regarding a submission that the contractor initially described as a proposal under the "Equitable Adjustments" clause of its contract.

The finding is notable because the Contract Disputes Act (CDA), which allows contractors to challenge the government's contract decisions up to a board of contract appeals or a court, requires those contractors to do so based on either an adverse "final decision" or improper delay (amounting to a "deemed denial") involving a claim, rather than the more informal Requests for Equitable Adjustments (REAs).