ABMC.gov O&M - Vendor RFIs.xlsx
XLSX spreadsheet 29 KB Posted
- Attached to
- ABMC. gov Website Operations & Maintenance
- Solicitation number
- 20250404_SAMRFP_WebsiteOandM
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- Not on record
About this file
This file is a Vendor Request for Information (RFI) spreadsheet for the American Battle Monuments Commission (ABMC) website Operations and Maintenance (O&M) contract. The solicitation seeks a contractor to provide comprehensive website support and maintenance for ABMC.gov, a newly launched WordPress-based site with content including news, multimedia, events, cemetery details, education materials, and a burial database. Key requirements include subject matter experts in WordPress and Azure with T2 Public Trust clearance, mandatory system access by June 15, 2025, and support during standard business hours with a 99.9% service level agreement.
The contract comprises multiple Contract Line Item Numbers (CLINs), with CLIN 1 being the primary website support and maintenance task. Optional CLINs include theme updates, an AI chatbot deployment, and site assessments. The procurement is a full and open competition with no small business set-aside. Potential contractors must provide resumes for key personnel, demonstrate past performance in both WordPress and Azure technologies, and be prepared to implement a ticketing system. The agency anticipates approximately 1-2 service tickets per week and is open to alternative staffing and pricing models. Pricing details will not be pre-disclosed, with ABMC expecting fair and reasonable proposals from interested vendors.
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| File | Type | Posted |
|---|---|---|
| PWS_ABMC.GOV Website OM v6 FINAL.pdf |
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Sheet1
| ABMC.gov O&M Vendor RFIs | ||
| RFIs | ABMC Response: | |
| 1 | Pg. 6, CLIN 1 item 6: To provide accurate pricing, can the government clarify roughly how many times per year the following tasks may be requested: |
• Modify site structure and content layouts as directed by ABMC Public Affairs and IT teams.
• Develop and implement changes to user interfaces, databases, APIs, and site branding.
| • Develop modules and integrations per ABMC requirements. | 1 | We anticipate needing between approximately one (1) sprint per year to keep the site relevant. However in rare circumstances we may request two (2) sprints, such as the upcoming 105 anniversary. | ||
| 2 | Pg. 12, CLIN 0004 (Optional): Deploy and Support Artificial Intelligence (AI) Chatbot: Will the contractor be responsible for sourcing and evaluating the generative AI platform (e.g., ChatGPT Gov), or has a preferred solution already been identified? | 2 | Agency will source and evaluate the Gen AI platform. No solution has been identified today. | |
| 3 | Pg. 12, CLIN 0004 (Optional): Deploy and Support Artificial Intelligence (AI) Chatbot: What volume of live agent handoffs is anticipated? Should we plan to support integration with a live chat tool or helpdesk/ticketing platform? | 3 | The “live agent” will be an ABMC staff or designee. ABMC normally receives about 5-10 inquiries per day. Contractor may suggest a live chat tool and accompanying ticketing platform so ABMC staff can follow up. | |
| 4 | Pg. 12, CLIN 0004 (Optional): Deploy and Support Artificial Intelligence (AI) Chatbot: Does ABMC have an internal team or SME who will help train the chatbot, or is full language processing training and configuration the contractor’s responsibility? | 4 | Agency will source and evaluate the Gen AI platform. No solution has been identified today. | |
| 5 | Pg. 12, CLIN 0004 (Optional): Deploy and Support Artificial Intelligence (AI) Chatbot: Will the live agent handoff include integration with voice or phone-based support, or is it limited to chat-based handoff only? | |||
| 5 | Agency will source and evaluate the Gen AI platform. No solution has been identified today. | |||
| 6 | Who is currently maintaining and operating website? | 6 | Avatar Computing, Inc. ABMC contract: 74330222C0055 | |
| 7 | Does the website have an ATO or will there be a requirement to get an ATO? | 7 | O&M contractor will maintain up to date documents and provide all deliverables as outlined in the PWS. ABMC will review all documents in its ATO process. | |
| 8 | Would you consider making this procurement a small business set ? | 8 | This is a full & open competition acquisition. | |
| 9 | What is the current ticketing system in use? | 9 | Contractor shall propose a ticketing system for tickets and issues related to the website and its services. | |
| 10 | On average, how many service tickets are handled daily, weekly, and monthly? | 10 | Approximately 1-2 tickets per week. | |
| 11 | How many helpdesk agents do you anticipate on performing the task. | 11 | ABMC does not expect any help desk agent on this contract. All proposed personnel are required to be SMEs in WordPress, Azure, etc. as outlined in the work statement. | |
| 12 | How much area of support is the contractor required to support in Azure cloud engineering? | 12 | ABMC requires support during standard business hours and service level agreement of 99.9% for services maintained by the Contractor. | |
| 13 | Which virtual server is being used? Is there any backup server? | 13 | ABMC uses Azure app services and no infrastructure-as-a-service is used. The service is highly available using Azure app services. O&M Contractor shall evaluate and propose backup schema. | |
| 14 | Can you share the total funding allocated for CLIN 1 (Website Support & Maintenance) in the | |||
| base year and each option year? | 14 | ABMC does not share this information. Interested parties are invited to offer their best proposals. | ||
| 15 | Is there a target or “not to exceed” dollar amount established for any of the optional CLINs |
(e.g. CLIN 0002/0003 theme updates, CLIN 0004 AI chatbot, CLIN 0005 assessment) or the
| project in total? | 15 | ABMC does not share this information. Interested parties are invited to offer their best proposals. |
| 16 | Are there pre set labor rates or price caps for key labor categories (e.g., Azure Specialist, | |
| WordPress Developer, Accessibility Expert) that we should be aware of? | 16 | ABMC expects that all pricing will be fair and reasonable to the US Government. Interested parties are invited to offer their best proposals. |
| 17 | How is the budget phased over the base year and option years? Does ABMC expect equal |
allocations each year, or are some years (e.g., option years with redesign CLINs) expected
| to carry higher spend? | 17 | Decisions to execute option year(s) are based on contractor performance, availability of funds, and US Government needs. Option year proposals do not have to be equal as projected work and technical requirements are not equal. | ||
| 18 | How much has ABMC spent historically on website O&M? | 18 | ABMC does not share this information. Interested parties are invited to offer their best proposals. | |
| 19 | How much did ABMC spend on the new ABMC.gov launched in March 2025? | 19 | 74330222C0055, $527,500.00 | |
| 20 | Who is the current contractor providing ABMC.gov O&M services, and what is their contract | |||
| reference or award number? | 20 | This is a new requirement and there is no incumbent for O&M support. | ||
| 21 | Can you share any high level lessons learned or areas of improvement ABMC sees from the | |||
| incumbent’s performance to date? | 21 | ABMC does not share this information. Interested parties are invited to offer their best proposals. | ||
| 22 | Are there elements of the current service model (e.g. existing background cleared staff) | |||
| that ABMC views as critical for maintaining continuity? | 22 | This requirement is outlined in the PWS. | ||
| 23 | Is ABMC open to alternative staffing models or pricing structures (e.g. blended rates, | |||
| fixed price bundles for multiple CLINs) that may differ from the incumbent’s approach? | 23 | Yes. | ||
| 24 | What factors would drive ABMC to change vendors from your current vendor at award time? |
Are there specific price performance thresholds or service metrics that would enable a
| non incumbent to be selected? | 24 | This is a new requirement and there is no incumbent for operation and maintenance support. ABMC will carefully review all proposals according to the evaluation criteria in the PWS. |
| 25 | Can ABMC clarify at what point in the evaluation process the background check/NACI |
adjudication must be completed? Must resumes be fully cleared at proposal submission or
| only by award? | 25 | Cleared subject matter expects must be ready to provide hands-on support as outlined in the PWS. |
| 26 | The RFP states, “Contractor personnel must possess an active clearance or pass a |
background check.” and “Staff have to be cleared by June 15.”
| a. What is ABMC’s process for background checks? | 26 | ABMC partners with OPM for background check procedures. | ||
| 27 | Will ABMC allow the clearance process to begin pre-award to facilitate the awardee | |||
| meeting this deadline? | 27 | No, ABMC would incur fees and only submit candidates to OPM after award. | ||
| 28 | Confirm staff only need an active clear or a background check. | 28 | Active clear. | |
| 29 | Please specify the clearance level required for staff to maintain on this project. | 29 | T2 Public Trust | |
| 30 | If a proposed team member holds equivalent certifications but not the exact ones listed, is | |||
| there a formal waiver or review process? | 30 | It depends. ABMC personnel officer would assess and make the adjudication. | ||
| 31 | Beyond the CLINs defined today, does ABMC have a vision or priority list for emerging |
capabilities (e.g., personalized user journeys, advanced analytics dashboards, marketing
| automation) that we could begin to plan for now? | 31 | The PWS outlines ABMC’s immediate needs. When a need arises, ABMC will issue a RFQ. |
| 32 | How does ABMC envision handling ongoing optimization? Would you prefer quarterly |
‘innovation sprints,’ periodic usability studies, or another cadence for proposing and
| implementing enhancements? | 32 | As a commemorative agency, ABMC invites feedbacks and suggestions to meet our mission. |
| 33 | Which key performance indicators (KPIs) will ABMC use to judge website effectiveness (e.g., |
page-load times, search success rates, user satisfaction scores), and how often would you
| like those reported? | 33 | ABMC currently uses a tool to gather that information and will make adjustments when data suggests it. We usually do not use a time-driven factor. |
| 34 | Would ABMC be open to integrating periodic user research (surveys, remote card-sorts, |
moderated usability tests) into the support contract to ensure the site remains intuitive for
| diverse audiences? | 34 | ABMC currently uses a tool to gather that information and welcomes additional feedback and suggestions. |
| 35 | In addition to the Section 508/WCAG audits, is ABMC interested in regular accessibility user |
testing with assistive-technology users to catch real-world issues that automated tools
| might miss? | 35 | Yes, ABMC website has a diverse global audience and welcomes feedback and suggestions. | ||
| 36 | Is CLIN 1 the only deciding factor for award since the other CLINs are optional or will the total of all CLINs be used as the primary deciding factor for award? | 36 | All CLINs will be considered. | |
| 37 | Is there an incumbent doing the O&M now? If yes, will there be turn-over time allotted when the contract is awarded? | 37 | This is a new website just launched in March 2025 and there’s no O&M incumbent. Transition from the developer team will begin on June 15, 2025. | |
| 38 | Is there currently a prioritized backlog documenting bugs, feature requests? If yes, how large is it (number of items)? | 38 | The developer team is working on a backlog based on priorities set by ABMC. The list currently has six (6) backlog items, and eight (8) pending items. |
| 39 | When reviewing the redesign PWS we saw there were 254K Drupal nodes. As part of CLIN 1 efforts, how much of this content still needs to be migrated from? | 39 | All contents have been migrated. |
| 40 | Are we migrating everything from Drupal 10? | 40 | Not applicable for this PWS. |
| 41 | Are there existing migration .yml files we would be using, or would we be creating new ones? | 41 | Not applicable for this PWS. |
| 42 | How often would migrations need to run? | 42 | Not applicable for this PWS. |
| 43 | Are editors entering content into the old (Drupal) system anymore? | 43 | No. |
| 44 | Are there cron jobs in place for the current migrations? | 44 | Not applicable for this PWS. |
| 45 | Can you provide a content map/data structure for the site (e.g. content types) | 45 | The file is approximately 100Mb, and ABMC can provide it to the selectee. |
| 46 | Does the codebase live publicly? | 46 | No. |
| 47 | Where is the repo? | 47 | Microsoft Azure DevOps |
| 48 | Is there an existing support ticket system in place or would the vendor be required to create one? If there is, are you happy with it or looking for an improvement? | 48 | Contractor shall provide a ticketing system for the purposes of tracking tickets reported by ABMC regarding the website. |
| 49 | Is there a need to create any training or help documentation for the public affairs, IT team users or any others who add/edit website content? | 49 | ABMC staff received training during the development of the site and no additional content editor training is expected at this time. However please consider that the contract is for up to seven years and new technology may require new training and Contractors shall propose training plans. |
| 50 | Is the requirement to support help requests from any/all 500 ABMC staff members? If not, how many content creators/users (public affairs, ABMC IT) need to be supported? | 50 | ABMC has 500 staff but only the website team is involved in the maintenance, upkeep of the site and require support. |
| 51 | Will the ABMC require a dedicated, full-time NIST compliance specialist (either on-site or remote) as part of the contractor team? | 51 | No |
| 52 | Does ABMC currently employ a NIST compliance specialist internally? | 52 | No |
| 53 | Could you kindly provide a breakdown of the current roles and structure within the ABMC IT team that the selected contractor will be collaborating with? | 53 | Contractor would report to the CORs, including CIO, Deputy CIO, IT Director, and system administrator(s). |
| 54 | Please confirm when contractor personnel are required to hold security clearance: | ||
| At the time of proposal submission, | |||
| At the time of award, or | |||
| By the project start date (noted as June 15, 2025)? | 54 | Contractors with system access are required to have favorable adjudication for T2 Pubic Trust on or before June 15, 2025. | |
| 55 | What is the historical and/or anticipated level of effort for each CLIN in terms of labor categories and hours per period of performance? | 55 | ABMC does not provide the independent government cost estimate to contractors, however we invite proposers to assess the site’s public facing interface and publicly available data to make an informed, reasonable proposal. |
| 56 | Is there an existing ticketing system? | 56 | No |
| 57 | Section 3 of the Proposal Response Template requires resumes of key personnel. Please define which positions are key personnel, and how many total resumes must be submitted. | 57 | Resume are required for all subject matter experts (SMEs) needing ABMC system access to perform operation and maintenance support. |
| 58 | Section 4 of the Proposal Response Template requires pricing for each CLIN. As the SOW is presented, there is significant risk for offerors in providing pricing, as many of the tasks within the optional CLINs are interconnected or require additional information or decisions to determine an accurate level of effort through which to establish an accurate price. Additionally, labeling the majority of the SOW (5 out of 6 CLINs) as optional, but requiring pricing, puts strain and risk on offerors who will need to dedicate significant resources to develop a response or potentially source labor to meet the requirements without guarantee the work will be actioned. In order to alleviate risk to offerors, we recommend the Government provide an exact level of effort, complete with labor categories and total labor hours per position, for each CLIN. Or, as another option, the Government could require pricing only for CLIN 1 in the proposal response. | 58 | PWS requires pricing for all CLINs. |
| 59 | Should the technical response and pricing response be housed in separate volumes? Is the 30 page limit then the total for all volumes combined? | 59 | Pricing response can be housed as a separate volume and would not count towards the 30 page limit. |
| 60 | Specific criteria or conditions for escalating an issue from Level 2 to Level 3. | 60 | We will have discussions and general guidelines about ticket levels. However, as outlined in the draft proposed support tier, specific circumstances may require a ticket to be an immediate Level 3 even though it may be a Level 2 in normal times. This is to reflect the fact that ABMC.GOV website is a digital extension and tool that communicates status of our global cemetery sites. |
| Contractor’s ticketing system should have options for ABMC to inform that a ticket should be given Tier 2 or 3 attention. This system will communicate to Contractor ABMC’s classification of the ticket priority. | |||
| We do not expect to request frequent Level 3 tickets and will communicate to Contractor when an issue needs to be at Tier 3 regardless of its technical difficulty. | |||
| 61 | We do not expect to request frequent Level 3 tickets and will communicate to Contractor when an issue needs to be at Tier 3 regardless of its technical difficulty. | 61 | Contractor shall be thorough and deliver quality work on time and without significant revisions. |
| 62 | Is the company that did the initial build of the website eligible to compete for this work? | 62 | Yes. |
| 63 | Page 4 (Overview) states that "ABMC requires a qualified contractor to have personnel that are cleared and favorably adjudicated by ABMC to provide comprehensive website support and maintenance services for its public website and its infrastructure…Contractor shall provide personnel that can be favorably adjudicated by ABMC to start work no later than June 15th, 2025." Page 18 (Section 3 - Key Personnel and Past Performance), however, states that offerors need to provide "resumes of key personnel with background check." Can the government please clarify whether offerors must provide personnel who already have an NACI clearance, or that the government will conduct the background check for all key personnel prior to beginning work on June 25th? | 63 | Key personnel are required to be favorably adjudicated by ABMC by June 15, 2025. Resume for all key personnel are also required. |
| 64 | Please identify the Key Personnel required. | 64 | All Microsoft Azure and WordPress subject matter experts with access to ABMC.GOV computer systems are key personnel. |
| 65 | Page 6 (CLIN 1) states that, "Contractor personnel must include project managers, WordPress Developers, visual/user experience specialists, Azure specialists, and accessibility experts." Page 18 (Section 3) states that contractors must provide "resumes of key personnel." Can the government please confirm which positions listed on Page 6 are considered Key Personnel? | 65 | All Microsoft Azure and WordPress subject matter experts with access to ABMC.GOV computer systems are key personnel. |
| 66 | Will the government allow offerors to submit key personnel resumes as appendices to the Proposal Response Template to save writing space for the technical approach and Past Performance descriptions? | 66 | Yes. |
| 67 | Does the government have a preferred format/spreadsheet for the Section 4: Price Proposal? If so, can the government please provide that format? | 67 | Offerors shall propose pricing based on the CLINs. A separate format/spreadsheet will not be issued. |
| 68 | Do all three Past Performance references need to include WordPress and Azure or one of the two technologies? | 68 | Must be on both technologies similar to ABMC's environment in order to be considered as past performance. Having only one technology creates a potential variable that makes it difficult to compare this criteria. |
| 69 | Can the government please clarify where in the Proposal Response Template offerors should clarify any assumptions they are making for this opportunity? | 69 | Assumptions can be in Appendix section. |
| 70 | The Proposal Response Template does not currently allow offerors to insert a Table of Contents or a Cover Letter in the response. Would the government please allow offerors to insert a Table of Contents and a Cover Letter in the response, and can those artifacts please be exempt from the 30-page limit for the response volume? | 70 | Yes, offers may include a Table of Contents and Cover Letter. They will not count as part of the 30 page of proposal response. |
| 71 |
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