Solicitation Amendment - Instructions to Offerors.pdf

Addendum to FAR 52.212-1 Instructions to Offerors – Commercial Items (Sep 2023)

(a) Inquiries

For information about any aspect of this Request for Quotations (RFQ), offerors must only contact the individual listed on Standard Form 1449, Page 1, Block 7a. Accordingly, you must direct all communications to the Contracting Officer, Matthew Manning, via e-mail at Matthew.Manning@opm.gov. We will post questions and answers on the System for Award Management (SAM) website at: www.SAM.gov.

(b) Questions Submitted by Prospective Offerors We must receive all RFP questions or issues requiring clarification in writing no later than DATE AND TIME. We will answer all questions or issues requiring clarification we receive by DATE AND TIME and include them in an amendment to this RFP, which we will post on the SAM website noted above. You must clearly and succinctly phrase your questions and reference the applicable RFP section number when possible.

You must e-mail all RFP questions or issues requiring clarification to Matthew Manning, Contracting Officer, at OPMContracting@opm.gov. You are responsible for confirming receipt of any electronic mail.

(c) Exception(s) to Solicitation Terms and Conditions The offeror must state in the proposal any exception(s) taken to the solicitation terms and conditions. The offeror must state exception(s) in a cover letter conveying the offer. The following minimum information must be conveyed: (1) acceptance of terms and conditions identified; (2) reason for any exception(s); and (3) any other information relevant to any exception(s).

(d) Instructions for Submission of Written Proposals

(i) General Instructions

This section provides instructions that the offeror must follow in preparing proposals in response to this RFP.

(a) OPM will only evaluate those proposals that fully meet our requirements as outlined in

Section (d) and that respond to the instructions in this Section. In situations where teams are formed to respond to this RFP, a single organization must be identified as the prime offeror.

This organization will be responsible for meeting our requirements described in Section (d), and will contract directly with the Government. In addition, we request offerors provide a single point of contact that is responsible for interacting with OPM for the duration of this competition.

(b) We recognize that information requested, in particular pricing data, may be confidential.

Proprietary information must be protected from improper disclosure under Federal law.

Offerors must appropriately mark submitted materials as proprietary, where such restrictions should apply.

(c) Offerors must submit their proposals via e-mail to Matthew Manning, Contracting Officer, at

OPMContracting@opm.gov. You are responsible for confirming receipt of your e-mail.

Offerors must provide their proposals in Microsoft Word, PDF, and/or Excel formats.

(d) Offerors must prepare a technical proposal and a price proposal in separate volumes. We request you do not provide brochures and other material used for marketing purposes. We will not consider such material in evaluating responses to this RFP.

mailto:Matthew.Manning@opm.gov https://www.sam.gov/ mailto:OPMContracting@opm.gov mailto:OPMContracting@opm.gov

(e) As stated below Section (e)(2)(d)(ii), some sections of the offeror’s technical proposal count toward a 60-page limit. We will delete and will not evaluate the pages that exceed this 60-page limit. There is no page limit for the offeror’s price proposal. You must use Times New Roman 11-point font, or larger, and must have margins of at least one inch on all sides. Page headers and footers may fall within the margins. Tables, diagrams and footnotes may use smaller font sizes. You must number all pages.

(f) As specified on the Standard Form 1449, Page 1, Block 8, we must receive all proposals by

DATE AND TIME.

(ii) Technical Proposal Volume

(a) The offeror’s technical proposal must contain the following sections:

(1) Technical Capability Summary

(2) Experience and Past Performance;

(3) Technical Approach;

(4) Qualifications of Professional Staff;

(5) Medical Review Writing Samples.

(b) Technical Proposal Volume Instructions

(1) Technical Capability Summary – This section of your proposal counts toward the 60-page limit. Offerors must provide a summary description (not to exceed 10 pages) of the company’s capabilities and how they will be applied to meet the mandatory requirements of the PWS.

(2) Experience: This section of your proposal counts toward the 60-page limit. You must provide:

Prime Contractor Overview:

The proposed prime contractor must provide information on its overall status of business including that of all proposed subcontractors. This is necessary to assess the offeror’s ability to provide services for the duration of the contract. The overview must contain the following:

• Company name and the names of business units that possess the experience and capabilities required;

• Company ownership and nationality; and

• Prime contractor size in terms of average annual gross receipts over the past three years.

• Prime contractor, consultants and all subcontractors must be located within the

United States

Additionally, the following information is required:

• Point of contact for purposes of communicating with us about this RFP, including contact name, title, postal address, telephone number and e-mail address.

• Staffing Plan – The offeror must provide a staffing plan that is adequate to meet the stated requirements. This staffing plan must include qualified and experienced key personnel and the back-ups to fill in for the key personnel when the key personnel are on vacation, leave, etc. The staffing plan must also include details showing the proposed staffing structure. The staffing plan must include details for using consultants/subcontracts as key personnel, the frequency of using the consultants/subcontractors as key personnel, and the functions to be performed by the consultants/subcontractors as key personnel. See OPM- Specific Clause 1752.209-71 Contractor’s Key Personnel (July 2005) for requirements regarding key personnel.

Proposed Subcontractors:

To the extent that you intend to subcontract work required to meet the objectives in the PWS, you must provide a list of proposed subcontractors and a description of each proposed subcontractor’s role and qualifications in providing the required services. You must describe your prior experience working with each subcontractor on tasks similar to that described in the PWS. You must describe the rationale for using subcontractors, and explain how the participation of each subcontractor increases the value to the government.

Additionally, in order to demonstrate your capabilities and ability to achieve the objectives described in Section (d), you must provide details of same/similar services that you have performed within the past three years or are performing. In order to evaluate past performance, we require that you provide a list of similar service arrangements that you have been engaged in or are engaged in. We will use this list (at least five, but not more than ten) as references.

This list must contain the following:

• Name of the customer;

• Contract type;

• Contract value;

• Period of performance;

• Customer point of contact (name, telephone number, e- mail address) from the past three years;

• Description of work performed, including a statement of the similarities of the work and the proportion of the work performed to that of the services described in the PWS; and

• List of significant subcontractors.

In addition, all major subcontractors (those who you expect will receive a share of the payments we will make that will be greater than 10% of the total payments over the life of any contract arising from this RFP) must provide a list of at least five agreements for customers for whom they performed work of a similar nature to that which they are proposed to perform under this contract. We will use these as references. The list must contain the same information as for the prime contractor.

(3) Technical Approach: This section of your proposal counts toward the 60-page limit. Offeror must provide a detailed description of how you intend to successfully complete the PWS from a managerial perspective. The response must include the following:

• Fully supported narrative that demonstrates a clear understanding of the requirement to provide medical and dental health benefit reviews for disputed claims and preservice (prior approval and precertification) requests, consultative services, and special projects for the FEHB Program.

• Quality Assurance Approach and Plan – The offeror must provide a description of the offeror’s approach to quality assurance for the activities described in the PWS. The quality assurance approach must include a description of the offeror’s plan to track and report performance and a detailed description of the process established to assure the accuracy of all data and capture quality including any penalties assessed.

• Project Management Approach and Plan – The offeror must provide a description of a project management approach and business management plan that identifies and defines methods that will be used for the management and execution of services. It must include:

o Project management methodologies, any certifications your organization has and will apply to this work and any approaches you intend to utilize in your services implementation.

o Methodology for managing anticipated and unanticipated workload variances, i.e., accommodating multiple requests for the same medical or dental specialty with identical return dates.

o Detailed management approach to problem resolution.

o Approach to staff continuity, specifically, how the offeror plans to foster positive employee morale, train, and recruit staff to perform the tasks. In addition, the offeror must provide an approach to assure a particular level of consistency and limited turnover of staff. We reserve the right to remove an employee from the project for performance reasons.

• Subcontractor Management Plan – The offeror must specify how the offeror will manage proposed subcontractors with an emphasis on monitoring and evaluating performance, including performance levels, communications processes and management methodologies. You must include descriptions of the tasks that each subcontractor will perform, including estimates of the percentage of the payments we will make over the life of any contract arising from this RFP that the subcontractors will receive. You must describe the risks associated with the addition of subcontractors to the offeror’s team, and explain how the subcontractor management plan mitigates those risks.

• Provide Certificate of Insurance. That includes malpractice and liability insurance.

• Assumptions – The offeror must describe any assumptions made in preparing this portion of the proposal. We will evaluate all assumptions for reasonableness. All assumptions should be provided in your proposal in a section identified as ‘assumptions.’

(4) Qualifications of Professional Staff: This section of your proposal does not count toward the 60-page limit. You must submit:

• Resumes for key personnel, back-ups for key personnel, and non-key professional personnel – The offeror must provide current complete resumes for proposed key personnel, back-ups for key personnel, and non-key professional personnel identified for this project. The offeror may name additional key personnel at your discretion. Key personnel include contractor employees, consultants, and subcontractor employees. Resumes must contain information on education/training, background, period of employment with the contractor, general experience, and specific experience related to the PWS. Letters of commitment are required for all key personnel. The letter of commitment must be directed to supporting the program including the length of the individual’s commitment and must be signed by the individual and a corporate official.

• List of physician or other designated specialists who are available to perform medical reviews, their education and licensure or certification.

(5) Medical Review Writing Samples: This section of your proposal does not count toward the 60-page limit. The offeror must provide five medical review writing samples/medical reports, with accompanied questions as addressed to a medical specialist at the time of their review, in the following areas:

• Psychiatry;

• Hematology/oncology;

• Physical medicine, rehabilitation, or pain management;

• Reproductive endocrinology; and

• Coding specialist.

Offerors must use the Medical Review Format (Attachment 3) for this submission.

(iii) Price Proposal Volume

(a) The offeror’s price proposal must contain:

(1) Signed Standard Form (SF) 1449, Solicitation/Contract/Order for Commercial

Items;

(2) Completion of Blocks 12, 17, 23, 24, and 30 of SF 1449;

(3) Section (b)(2) Blocks 19-24 Continued (Tables 1A-1E);

(4) Signed acknowledgement copies of RFP amendments (if any); and

(5) Quality Assurance Surveillance Plan (Table 2).

(b) Proposals, signed by an official authorized to bind the offeror, must set forth full, accurate, and complete information as required by this RFP. The penalty for making false statements is prescribed in 18 USC 1001. Failure to furnish full and complete information requested may cause us to determine an offeror to be unacceptable.

(c) Price Proposal Volume Instructions

(1) The Government anticipates adequate price competition under this RFP. We will not request offerors to submit certified cost or pricing data with their proposals.

If the Government determines additional supporting cost or pricing data is needed to conduct effective or meaningful negotiations or to determine the reasonableness of prices, we will request offerors to provide such data.

(2) In support of proposed prices, offerors must indicate if prices are based on established commercial prices or rates. If so, provide the following additional information:

• A copy of any current catalog or established price list for the services covered by the offer;

• An explanation of the offeror’s commercial pricing and discounting practices, including how the prices proposed for this RFP were computed;

and,

• A statement that the prices quoted herein, including consideration of any discount or rebate arrangements, do not exceed prices charged the offeror’s most favored customer for like services in similar quantities under comparable conditions.