contentions are ones of law that being said we understand there are dueling motions but we wouldn't ask this court given the and evidentiary standard before it to say that we are absolutely right the government is absolutely wrong we would say that there are enough gaps in contract they have to argue that the ambiguity is either pigment or latent right correct or are so is your position that it's a latent ambiguity yes that's correct right and that would mean as i understand it that you would have to establish not only that there's a reasonable interpretation that's different than the government's and that's what you spend a lot of time on but you'd also have to establish that you rely upon that ambiguity in terms of preparing in submitting your bid and entering into the contract is that right yes that's correct your honor i so did you present any such reliance evidence your honor our contention would claim that is that we relied on for our appeal that developed and changed as a result of receiving the contracting officers decision saying no the treasury sets the rates and therefore you should look to the treasury for this doesn't that kill your reliance argument though if you if you were lying on a mistake of fact so you weren't ramai on the fact that it was the prefer the rate you were relying on the fact there was some other rate that you now admit could have been right and i don't believe that's exactly correct your honor we were allowing a prevailing rate a known rate of publicly available rate at the time again we believe that was the bank of afghanistan rate but irrespective it was a market based rate that's what  we reasonably assumed when we entered into the contract and that could be again the bank afghanistan and the the treasury rate and those rates aren't materially different and what they would have offered what is materially different is the undisclosed i t s five million slightly less under the bank of afghanistan right but still in the same ballpark did you present any evidence in the record that there could be any other possible rate other than the three percent five percent and the treasury rate we believe your honor that the government has admitted as much or they introduced into the record a declaration of mr walker would actually to declarations of mr walker would who works for i office local d o d finance and how do you wait the treasury with the department of defense we wouldn't believe what our argument was before the trial court is that there is no posted rate  actually performing contract work and given the contradict officer statement that the local offices millington tennessee they would have no reason to even search out these alternative locations no local d o t finance office in afghanistan in the entirety of ghana san both parties now free that that is incorrect and logically wouldn't be a correct interpretation of the contract clause it was true in procedure to affix a piece of paper to the us of a bank teller window at the base essentially for military banking transactions so if you know someone who comes onto the base for a financial transaction who has access that they  rate at the time it was being applied which logically makes sense your honor they didn't say when that standard operating procedure started i believe in fairness to the government they posit that it was the entire contract period that's the clarity we don't have  of the local d o d finance office your honor it's ambiguous the clause doesn't define what constitutes a local finance office and we would suggest that having a location somewhere in the country that the contractor is an informed of and can obviously if we believe that the railing rate was in line what was paid we wouldn't be here today i think what  competent officer was referencing and of course that rate which we found the quarterly treasury rates which are available on the treasury's website are in line with the bank accounts and rates a little bit more favorable so we adopted that as being in substantial compliance of the contract and officer was telling us would apply and then comparing that to the payments you received obviously there was a disconnect which is where we kind of got this treasury rate argument from and then reading the government's cross motion once we got to the trial court it also seemed to fit squarely in line with what the economic the financial management regulations for geo t v would suggest are proper and we can kind of get into this issue of and kind of running at a time already this issue of whether the government purchases currency and therefore whether the acquisition rate would be the official rate that applies and to talk to twelve we would cause it that it is and we would between three and five and the whole point in this case is that there are are alternatives that three and five are not the only two options unless we conclude that the contract is unambiguous there are not more than two alternatives to chose the one the issue is one what is the rate for about a contract and the contract is unambiguous that the rate that will be determined contracting officer said one thing here you know you had two different positions between the three and five percent i mean how can you say it's completely unambiguous when you can't seem to land on a definition but we did  there's no question that the contracting officer got it wrong saying that there is no deal the finance office in afghanistan saying that the militant tennessee which is where the corps finance office is that was wrong both parties agree it's wrong it doesn't make sense when you read the pla heard from june to twenty thirty eight august with fifteen there's been there's a single deal the finance office says posted the five day rate every week for the entire period in question that makes it on on a big us your honor because there is yes we can see that you cannot determine what rate what the actual rate is so simply by reading the text of the question you have to understand what's right and you can see there's no publicly available the self it doesn't say the rate it's exit says the rate will be determined by the local d o t finance always and we produce uncontroverted evidence during the entire payment period as to what those rates were for each payment that they could access it right and we both went for summary judgment and yes and there is yes and so the prior question regardless of whether or not they had noticed or not the first question is one of the contract requires that they have that notice in the contract doesn't the only issue really that the risk the legal issues i think are on a side issue as a matter of will how could we know what the radius is seems unfair that we have to pay a rate and we don't know what it is and as a matter of contract  ministration and you have a client who has a relationship with a contracting officer or contracting out for the representative and it is the contract numbers are presented say as we have here we have a picture of what the rates are if you if for some reason you can't access the base or you can't access the personnel the base let me see new evidence of what that rate is that should have happened in this case no question so the contract never should i don't mean to interrupt you know that it's only here that is the relationship between the contractor contracting officers that can effectively supply information that they may not be able to get directly if it's true that they can't access the base if they can't access the concert officers who should be able to tell should win as to whether or not they have a contract damages i mean it's really a case about contract damages there's no question that the government's position is that the five day rate controls three and there's no question they don't dispute as you heard misinterpret or say as a three day rate more favorable to nothing else to consider they make the point if we're trying to figure out what the right meeting them is likely i'd turn why don't we start with make manis saying there's do two different transactions that this case involves conversion so mean the core providing a dollar amount to i p s dot gov and then the afghanis amount that corresponds to that is then long the un the euro not that good and that's not what's going on here you don't have purchased going on here you have conversions through i test up a five day rate that was posted during the entire payment period is the official rate per the contract and i'm wrong i concede that the raise they receive is more favorable than the five day rate to the contrary therefore they have no damages they in fact benefited from the fact that the core used a more favorable rat we're going to pay you and we're going to pay you had an official rate and then we're going to decide later whatever that official rate you know what the contract says is that the current at this exact words a contract contract says that the current exchange rate will be a determined record as to why that was made but more importantly i'm honest conceded that that clause doesn't apply it's not a clause that that is incorporated into any of the three contracts at issue and there's no inference no reason embers can be made that that change was somehow made because there are some and you it ease with a spec to what the local da da of the finance office is because there is no ambiguity this back to what the local b finance office is based upon the fact that there are only one army finance office during this entire period that's posted a single five day rate for all sixty payments at issue so there is no ambiguity as to that because there's no ambiguity as to what rate applies under the contract by their rate and there's no dispute evidence that the three day rate that's more favorable to what they received they are not entitled to any damages because the afghanis but we have here is conversion which is a very different process directly there's no us financial institution in a very involved with a depository account has purchased this currency instead it's the core saying ok we need to we have  serves as one of two currently existing army finance offices are located in afghanistan so in fact your honor the evidence against their work to at one time i'm not sure what the ever office was posting that's not a again your honor we believe that the prevailing radiance of some point five billion dollars yes the answer is one point five million dollars when you signed on to the when you submitted your bid how did you know you were going to come out that that one point four now thank you for the questionnaire are we our question in return would be the three day rate is based on what is a market based rate is it based on the acquisition cost of the government is this money in money out and so far we've seen no evidence that's what you like to be as follows that's certainly a large portion of it your honor we know what the prevailing rate is and it's more favorable to us if the government is paying something else and we would certainly like to know what that is  fairness your honor if the government is receiving a certain rate to get afghan ian to pay us and that currency and we're seeing something different then that doesn't seem to be fair to the contractor in this position as you know i think in the context of actually said we're going to pay you what another market rate no your honor i think the contract i believe you know trying to be clear would say what the current contract clause says that the rate will be and there is a blank space to post that rate so that every party is on the same page about what's going to be applied during