The Contract Appeals Board provides an impartial, expeditious, inexpensive, and knowledgeable forum for hearing and resolving contractual disputes and protests involving the District and its contracting communities. The Procurement Practices Act vests the Board with exclusive jurisdiction to decide: protests of District contract solicitations and awards, appeals by contractors of District contracting officer final decisions, claims by the District against contractors, appeals by contractors of suspensions and debarments, and contractor appeals of interest payment claims under the Quick Payment Act.

The Board is composed of Administrative Judges who hear and decide the cases filed by the parties. The Board Rules govern practice and procedure in each case. For appeals, the rules contain optional accelerated disposition procedures (Rule 216) for any appeal where the amount in dispute is less than $100,000, an expedited small claims procedure (Rule 215) for disputes involving $10,000 or less, and alternative dispute resolution (ADR) procedures (Rule 217) in all appropriate cases. For protests, the Procurement Practices Act requires the Board to issue a decision within 60 business days of the protest filing. DC Code § 2-309.08 ("Protest procedures") and Chapter 3 of the Board Rules provide detailed requirements and rules governing protests of solicitations and awards.

The Board issues written decisions, which are published in the District of Columbia Register (DC Reg), and also in the electronic databases of LexisNexis and West Group. You may conduct full text searches of the Board's published decisions by linking to the published decisions search page.

Beginning in October 2001, the Contract Appeals Board became the first administrative tribunal to have comprehensive electronic filing in all of its cases. Read the Guidelines for Electronic File and Serve for more information.