contract itself and if there is an ambiguity is it resolved or has it unresolved wife or to both result to the construction rules that are there this is an idea if you contract it is important for everyone to remember that there are three different types of contracts that could be at issue here now what is your position was there an ambiguity or not no you're saying it's clear and you're basing that  during the fixed period after the minimum level and that's what takes it out of the concept of being an illusory contract there has to be a minimum level there otherwise it is in a looser recontract this is a contract that e b s entered into with respect to feeding troops and ask the record demonstrators it is and i believe the quote is from chief gibson a fluid process because you have in this case second chemical battalion from down south who is coming in to do a training exercise and they were going to be there for a month and a half and so you never knew your troops on the ground which but talents were go before task order one twelve which is why we're here today and they all work the same way and that is in the task order itself which was the implementation of the overwriting parent contract  the idea i q there was within the clinton section set forth the specific number of breakfasts lunch and dinner and yes there were estimates it then had a unit is not broken down that's why in the records when evey's employee saw this task order that had eventually been issued he called the washington guard who we thought was his core the employee called because you're absolutely right you're out of this was absolutely out of the norm this was unusual we submit to you deposition testimony from chief officer  because i asked him in his deposition if this is normal it went when do you see this his response was this was unusual which it was and in response to that he said you see this one it's one of those  doesn't say this is what you're going to be paid it is for daily meal breakdown which is again the usual procedure because there's logistics involved even if it doesn't just it actually does make sense because again remember the process in this case was that this task force started out as a direct acquisition contra because second camp battalion was going to do an exercise in yeah among and had come to east to say hey can you provide us meal services they then said you need to talk to the washington national guard people and fund this as a member i'm learning a lot of money in akron isms here but you know it's just the funding mechanism is so that you can use the id i q contra washington national guard said no we don't have the resources to be able to observe and watch out for this contract and therefore we're not going to allow you to use our idea i q contra evey's protested washington guard s at that point in time the employees from east went to a direct acquisition contract with second campbelltown and that's where this number of four hundred eighty three thousand sixty one was eventually issued and in that it specifically has the and you'll see eleven hundred troops because that's what it was based on the employee e b s grandiose direct acquisition numbers and a in the form of the task work and so that's the number that's where it comes from is four hundred eighty three thousand and sixty one dollars on the direct after station conference that's what was submitted to second come to tell you that exact number is the one that's used on task order one twelve and it says unit one unit price four hundred eighty three thousand and sixty one dollars in the context of how this all came together you know makes perfect sense and it does say unit one unit price and it doesn't say unit price estimate that says unit price four hundred eighty three zero sixty one because that's the firm fixed price it is unusual it is as if there is and i'm going to delve into the ambiguity part because i think my because the contra profer rent i'm sorry my latin's but that concept applies here and even if there was some sort of pattern ambiguity if it did apply all that needs to happen is a seeking of clarification and evy sought clarification in this case they sought clarification by calling sergeant de graaf you said just say thank you they also sought clarification because the second camp italian was acting as the core and they asked on several occasions do you want to modify the contract down from the eleven hundred that it was based on and they were told in no uncertain terms  other the top line of this where we see all the way to the right the forty three thousand six hundred dollars u s d that's the product of the multiplication that's occurring to the left of that so by the operation of the rules of grammar because we know th estimate if you look at all the other task orders it's six dollars and seventy cents for nine dollars and twelve cents very thin air that doesn't seem to be something that anyone has ever suggested is in fact an estimate that seems to be the fix where you might only see it which was right underneath the detail on the top that i was because i don't understand how you're trying to rationalize this is opposed to saying eleven o'clock at night that must have been drunk when you wrote it because i mean i don't i don't see how it makes i'm not buying your rational i think it certainly could have been written in a more clear fashion with respect to what that quantity pertains to but then when you go down to the next line and it directs you to the last repurchase of this task or you have the myriad of details that apply to this because it certainly could have been a done a different way i think in this circumstance it's an efficiency act that led them to do it this way rather than deconstructing those three spreadsheets that you see into potentially two hundred pages of specific injuries that fall i think that well actually could have been done a different way that is the that's the rationale that they had for getting this way to just a more efficient way to convey a significant amount of information and it helps to think about applies this is a tiny garbage it's a tiny garden in that tiny contractor typically they were provided services over a drill weekend which is a saturday and sunday three meals a day that level of information can easily be conveyed in what we're looking at on appendix three seventy six for the first time during the life of this contract you had it at the outside nick come to the training facility and want to use not only the field where the trade happened which some of the contract has anything to do with how i interpret mine which is the quantity which supposed to be indefinite nature and the fixed price you know price which in every other contract of this kind is a fixed price and it's usually articulate you know that per meal base what i think it helps to go back to the idea prevails so even if we were to adjust the unit that we're discussing here from a specific meal to a specific time period that would create a conflict between the idea that you contract a under summary of services in the second sentence meals shall be provided to customers at fixed prices negotiated by the u s p s over washington now and it provides that makes prices you know  for eighty three it makes absolutely no sense it's clearly just a message it is not something that i would want to encourage people to do for quote officials who reason well i started to suggest this would serve well i mean i'm certainly not  clarification as provided in the last three pages of casually in twelve and knowing that the meal that the price for a meal is fixed what the ultimate result of that higher number is to come up to cover the potentiality of well in this case they provided one the price they're supposed to get for one is not in doubt well no i think you have to read that you have to read the contract in its entirety which is not only the page that we're focused on what the three pages of each all that follow that inform what we're reading so right underneath the single line that we're talking about it directs the parties to these last three pages which then have the the level of detail provided and we know from the contracting office deposition which is at page four twenty two of the appendix the reason that forty three that higher number remain there was because that's the number that was wired over from the active duty side and to cover her van in the event between the contractor and outside or an outside agency so that's where that number originated and then in the months after those original no negotiations happened what is the unit price for what unit cost one hundred eighty three thousand dollars why i don't think you can read this line here to answer that question i don't think what look at what can i read to answer that question what unit is the greek government agreeing to pay forty three thousand for one why don't i don't think i don't think that's how this is to be read i think because we think we know that the unit of measure for this contract is meals so that we have to read that next line or anything that directs us to look at these other three pages to read it otherwise it would create a conflict between the two documents never changed they were the identical numbers that were provided five days before any party executed this contract that's exactly what the active duty units need those are the number of years provided it alternately that was the compensation that was paid to the contractor matter of law in my point would be to get to that end you have to do that but the end result being that there is an ambiguity within this contract the the requirement to seek clarification it is pretty clear in this case because there was an you notice the potential for confusion and he didn't bring up the issue what he did bring up were two questions both center directed to the wrong people and both not going to reference to the issue one mean the formatting questions is am i looking at this right idea that the person within the government can answer the question in a favorable way to them has apparently not actual authority and therefore they can't get any money i understand will mean i understand a lot of the law pretty sure is very eligible for small companies like this that are seeking to serve their company and then i don't disagree with you but the flip side of that is when you receive a contract like this five days before you sign and you tell me that you noticed the potential for confusion right off the bat and you didn't bring it up you didn't ask the bottom line is this we didn't have to be here this was a very easy dispute to resolve because they asked that question what am i getting paid and they're told the answer and they're happy with it or they're not and that can be dealt with immediately can we're not in that full point of this clarification and what we know from the dalton the cessna case is that if you ask these vague questions if you ask questions that are not getting to the heart of the issue you need to ask all questions you need to ask the right questions and i can imagine a scenario where  a small contractor vidis this arrival of this active duty unit allowed them in one month even up to three hundred seventy thousand member allowed them in one month to make more than a wooden pallet here that that is what i think he was referring to there is that  may please a court and i'm sorry this will be scattered but last point first i don't think there's any evidence in the record that this was as much as they would make an entire year and i don't know that's relevant but it's just yes evey's is a smaller and it is but if you look at even task order one can it's for a significant amount of money this is a situation where you have to take that one and then go point seven through actually better before you said it but if you want to use a decimal point in order to make that be a line is clearly an unintentional screw but that doesn't create necessarily impunity if the whole rest of the contract informs everybody what the deal actually was and so that's kind of to be honest with you that is there which is on three seventy six says that those spreadsheets are daily meal break down the because i don't respectfully i don't think you can look at this and say there isn't some sort of ambiguity potentially based on that the dialogue that we're i still think it's clear and that is my argument but if there is all that had to be done and it isn't that you have to resolve the dispute you just have to seek clarification so the fact that our representative called and spoke to sergeant de graaf and then maybe he didn't have the actual authority did they seek clarification the answer is yes did they seek clarification by asking for a modification asking second kim do you want to modify this contract not just on but on several different occasions in order to change that one to zero point seven three that takes some modification east through its representative asked second can do you want to modify the contract and they were told no there's too many missing her moving part we don't know from time to time what's going to happen in this case and that's the nature of these types of exercises had there been a modification done again that's why task order one ten which is not an issue here is important there's a process to go through and it's a process that evey's was familiar with and had no problem going down that was not a