Plaintiff state filed suit alleging industry-wide illegal bid rigging by companies and individuals in the heating, ventilation and airconditioning (HVAC) business over the course of several years. Haggett allegedly conceived and implemented the bid rigging schemes with his staff, either concocting false bids – or “cover bids” – on competitors’ letterhead and then submitting them to
customers along with B-G Mechanical’s bids, or requesting that his competitors submit bids directly to the customers at prices higher than B-G Mechanical’s, causing customers to believe that B-G Mechanical’s bid was the lowest of three competitive bids,
which was not the case. Customers harmed by the alleged scheme include CTTransit, the State of Connecticut, Vernon Waste Water Pollution Control Authority and others. Most of the bids involved year-long Contract Maintenance Agreements (CMAs) to provide
preventative maintenance and service for a set price. These contracts were often worth more than the face value of the contract because customers often used the CMA vendor for any additional repair work above and beyond the contract. George Haggett, Christopher Link and Link Services settled for $160,000 civil penalties. See also Connecticut v. B-G Mechanical Serivices