10-253430RFP Attachment A - Scope of Work (SOW).docx

Attachment A Scope of Work (SOW)

The Responder shall adhere to the following minimum specifications, performance requirements and all terms and conditions within this solicitation.

1 General Requirements

1.1 The Contractor shall provide an Internet and Interactive Voice Response (IVR) payment processing system for Pinal County (County).

1.2 The Contractor must provide processing for multiple “brands” and types of cards at no cost to the County. The “brands” include, but are not limited to, MasterCard, Visa, Discover, American Express, Venmo, PayPal, Samsung Pay, Google Pay, and Apple Pay. All payment brands must be funded in the same timeframe at no additional cost.

1.3 The Contractor must provide electronic check transaction processing, electronic Debit Card processing and electronic funds transfer processing.

2 Security and Certification

2. 1 The Contractor’s payment processing system must have Secure Socket Layer (SSL) security technology for data encryption and protection during transmission to and from web servers. All web servers receiving sensitive data must have SSL keys installed to secure the transmission of the data and include a certified VeriSign certificate or comparable certificate.

2. 2 The Contractor must be currently Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI) and Cardholder Information Security Program (CISP) certified.

2.3 The Contractor must utilize Europay MasterCard and Visa (EMV) technology for authenticating credit and debit card transactions meeting ISO/IEC 7816 standards.

2.4 The Contractor must be Service Organization Control (SOC 1) certified and provide information that shows that the Contractor has adequate controls and safeguards in place when the Contractor hosts or processes data belonging to Pinal County customers.

3 Transaction Processing and Settlement

3.1 The Contractor shall transfer daily deposits electronically to multiple, separate County bank accounts on the day of transaction or within one (1) business day as directed by the customer. Contractor must also be able to process transactions and accept settlement files as required. The method of application varies by individual agency from standard point of sale equipment to various types of software data captured via personal computer to Internet-based applications to online/mobile payment gateways.

3.2 All transactions shall be processed in real time. Within twenty-four (24) hours of authorization, the payments must be submitted to the ACH (Automatic Clearing House) for processing and must be electronically deposited via ACH in the gross amount (i.e. in their entirety) directly into the County’s designated bank account. The system shall ensure that the County’s account cannot be debited if there is a negative balance at the close of the business day.

3.3 Deposits must be segregated per entity with individual identifiers. The County must be able to see each department’s deposits as its own line item rather than being integrated into one deposit.

3.4 The Contractor’s payment processing system must be available for use by customers twenty-four (24) hours a day, seven (7) days a week.

3.5 On-line and phone transactions from customers must allow for alpha-numeric character entry as well as international addresses.

3.6 The Contractor must provide for the authorization and settlement of transactions through the appropriate authorization and settlement networks and provide problem resolution to transaction and/or settlement discrepancies within two (2) business days.

3.7 The Contractor shall allow for accounts to be set up for a convenience fee to be paid by the customer or by the County department. This functionality shall be available for all accounts. Any convenience fee paid by the customer must be collected by the Contractor prior to distributing funds to the County.

3.8 The Contractor’s electronic payment service must maintain quality controls to minimize the occurrence of unintended duplicate payment transactions by customers, while allowing for customers to submit multiple intended payments.

3.9 A “shopping cart” feature shall be provided to allow citizens to make multiple payments to the same department with a single transaction.

3.10 The Contractor’s payment processing system shall have capability to flag transactions that exceed a predefined threshold of suspicious activity, and generate an alert for County administrators to review.

3.11 The Contractor’s payment processing system shall display payment pages and transaction receipts in the users’ preferred language. It is required that the payment processing system include a Spanish language option to both the payment pages and transaction receipts.

3.12 The Contractor’s payment processing system shall include features for processing chargebacks, and generate a notification of a chargeback to County administrators for review.

3.13 County administrators must authorize any refund requests initiated by customers.

3.14 The Contractor’s payment processing system shall not charge the end customer if a communication error occurs with any downstream system.

3.15 The Contractor’s plug and play terminals must be USB only and integrated to the payment system independent of network wiring, etc.

3.16 The Contractor shall work directly with the Treasurer’s Office and the Pinal County Treasurer Information Technology Department to ensure transaction processing and daily settlements comply and integrate with the technology, accounting and banking systems of the County.

4 Reporting Capabilities

4.1 The Contractor must provide daily, weekly, and/or monthly detail and summary reports electronically so that each department within the County can receipt the payment to the proper account(s). NOTE: Each department within the County may choose different methods of reporting; therefore, reporting capabilities must be flexible to accommodate each department’s reporting requirements. For example, there must be space for a parcel number as part of the payment information for property tax payments.

4.2 The Contractor shall provide a daily report via email detailing each department’s transactions from the previous day as well as a downloadable report formatted to process through the Treasurer System for the Pinal County Treasurer’s Office.

4.3 The Contractor must provide a monthly report to the Pinal County Treasurer’s Office summarizing the activity for all departments within Pinal County by department name, card type (with gross sales included), returns, net sales, and total transaction counts. NOTE: This report must include all card types.

4.4 Reporting and posting must be based on Arizona time: Mountain Standard Time (MST).

4.5 All reports must deliver real-time data and be available on demand without requiring a separate query or delayed access.

4.6 The ability to print third-party processor payment receipts for the end user to view transaction fees is preferred.

5 Administration Activities

5.1 The Contractor shall send original merchant account statements and terminal charges, if applicable, to the Pinal County Treasurer’s Office to the attention of the Treasurer on a monthly basis. Duplicate merchant account statements shall be sent to each department within Pinal County receiving the credit/debit card service.

5.2 The Contractor shall set up a separate account for each location at no charge to Pinal County. Contractor must have prior written authorization from the Pinal County Treasurer to set up a merchant account.

5.3 The Contractor must establish merchant and terminal identification numbers for each department that will enable the County department to identify each location processing transactions. The varying levels of County government are: County Management, Departments, Divisions with Departments, Sections/Programs with Divisions, and Individual Locations within Sections/Programs. Some departments may require invoicing and cost breakout down to the “Individual Locations within Sections/Programs” level. This is due to the unique cost accounting required for sections/programs receiving various forms of Federal and State funding, including but not limited to grants. The County reserves the right to add/delete County government locations at its sole discretion.

5.4 The Contractor shall provide County a minimum of ninety (90) days’ notice for any major upgrade and a minimum of thirty (30) days’ notice for any minor updates.

5.5 The Contractor must provide a minimum of ninety (90) days’ notice before Contractor makes any instruction and/or dialogue changes to the website or IVR telephone recording.

6 Terminals (Equipment & Software)

6.1 POS (Point of Sale) terminals must be provided with a zero floor limit. NOTE: County and the Contractor will determine the number of terminals if a contract is awarded. County reserves the right to acquire the required POS equipment from another source if in the best interests of the County.

6.2 The Contractor shall replace any malfunctioning equipment within two (2) business days, unless County and the Contractor have mutually agreed to an alternate timeframe that is documented in writing.

6.3 The Contractor shall deliver operating supplies within three (3) business days of notification to the Contractor by County. The Contractor must provide start-up supplies at NO additional cost to the County. Start-up supplies must include, but are limited to: sales tickets and credit vouchers.

6.4 The Contractor must provide credit/debit card readers and signature pads that are compatible with Microsoft Windows version 11 or greater.

6.5 The Contractor must provide equipment and software that is applicable for the County to process electronic revenue collection transactions and future applications for new Departments accepting credit/debit/ACH that will electronically receive an authorization code approving or disapproving the ticket transaction at no additional cost to the County.

6.6 The Contractor’s payment processing system shall have E-check verification capability. E-check verification must verify that an account is active and that the account has funds available. All E-check and ACH transactions shall undergo pre-posting validation in the same manner as credit card transactions. Transactions that cannot immediately be validated must be flagged as pending and forwarded to downstream systems.

6.7 The Contractor’s payment processing system is preferred to have capability to accept international transactions, and provide E-check/ACH processing capabilities for transactions involving Canadian and Mexican banks and/or other financial institutions.

7 Customer Service

7.1 The Contractor must provide telephone assistance during the hours of 7:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. MST Monday through Friday, excluding holidays recognized by Pinal County. Telephone assistance must include, but is not limited to: POS terminals, research, supplies, installation, problems, and replacement or malfunctioning equipment. If a POS terminal is down, the Contractor must allow for verbal authorization without a terminal.

7.2 The Contractor must have the capability to operate from the POS terminals located at various locations.

7.3 The Contractor must provide a contact name and contact information for a local representative that shall be available for assistance. Any personnel changes shall be communicated within one (1) week of the change.

7.4 The Contractor must provide training to department personnel at no cost as related to payment and credit/debit processing requirements (i.e. procedures for handling retrieval requests, charge backs, accessing reports and transaction data, upgrades to programs or machines, and/or other processes and procedures which may be required).

7.5 The Contractor must work together with the Pinal County Treasurer’s Office and the County Departments to implement credit/debit card applications in order to advise the County regarding the most cost-efficient alternative(s) and/or innovative solution(s).

8 Integration / Interfaces

8.1 The Contractor’s payment processing system must be able to interface with the Treasurer Receipting and Online Collection System (TROCS), a custom in-house developed application, and be able to accept nightly uploads of property parcel numbers, amounts due, and owner names through a secure FTP site or other secure transfer site.

8.2 The Contractor’s payment processing system must interface with the County’s Accela software.

8.3 The Contractor’s payment processing system must be able to interface with the County website by allowing form data to be passed from the County website to the Contractor site. As an example, the payment processing system must allow for a taxpayer to access their property tax bill through the County website and then be routed to the Contractor’s website for payment of that bill.

8.4 The Contractor’s payment processing system must have a test page allowing for the testing of data passing between systems.

8.5 The Contractor must supply an online payment gateway application programming interface (API) for integration into custom code projects, including but not limited to mobile development, web development, and desktop integrations. The Contractor must also supply individual and customizable webpages to process unique transaction types for each County department.

8.6 The Contractor’s payment processing system should integrate with Accela using the official Accela Web API. It is preferred to not employ the legacy HTTP-POST payment adapter.

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