245050 Supplemental Letter 2~1.pdf

CITY OF SALEM

FINANCE DEPARTMENT

CONTRACTS & PROCUREMENT DIVISION

SUPPLEMENTAL INFORMATION LETTER #2

July 31, 2024

RFP NO. 245050

FOR: Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Software and

Implementation Services

CLOSING DATE: August 16, 2024 at 4:00 PM (LOCAL TIME)

Attached are answers to questions received for the above referenced RFP. Thank you.

Shawna Self, CPPB

Purchasing Manager cc: File

Questions and Answers RFP 245050

1. Q) Has the city seen any pre-RFP demos or had meetings with any vendors? If so, who?

A) No, the City has not seen any pre-RFP demos or had meetings with software vendors regarding an ERP system.

2. Q) Is there a budget for this project published anywhere? If so where? If it's in a budget book, which page/section?

A) The amount budgeted for the project in FY 2025 is $6.3 million, which appears on page 209 of the City’s budget.

3. Q) In the Functional Matrix there is no code for identifying if a third party is needed.

How would you like us to respond to those?

A) Please use Column H (Module / System) or the comment field to indicate the name of the third-party provider.

4. Q) In the Reporting Matrix, it states to put a response in of S, TPS or NS for Column J, however Column J is the comment field. Please let us know if we are to use these response codes in the comment column or not.

A) Please use Column I to provide the response using the available responses of S, TPS, and NS.

5. Q) We would like to know if the City can provide a desired go-live date or timeline for the initial phase of the project? For example, is there any deadline or mandatory date that the new ERP system needs to be in production?

A) Go-live for the new system should occur no later than June 30, 2027. There is nothing mandating this date.

6. Q) Can the City provide the number of users broken down:

a. Advanced Users – Those that would have admin rights

b. Core Users – everyday users

c. Self-Service Users – occasional users with self-service needs

A) a. Approximately 10 users

b. Approximately 80 users

c. Approximately 850 users

7. Q) Does the City have an anticipated Go-Live target date(s)?

A) Go-live for the new system should occur no later than June 30, 2027.

8. Q) Has the City identified a budget for this initiative, and if so, is it possible to share?

A) The amount budgeted for the project in FY 2025 is $6.3 million, which appears on page 209 of the City’s budget.

9. Q) Has the City been in contact with other vendors prior to the release of this RFP? If so please list.

A) No, the City has not seen any pre-RFP demos or had meetings with software vendors regarding an ERP system.

10. Q) Please provide a detailed explanation as to what “incentive points” are, how you track them, how they impact pay, how are they earned/lost, etc. in reference to the following questions (821-825) of Attachment 17.

Payroll

Salary Administration

As an employee, I can earn incentive pay based on cumulative incentive points

Salary Administration

As a Payroll Administrator, I can define the incentive pays that are added to the base pay based on incentive points

Salary Administration

As an employee, I can earn incentive points based on certain activities (e.g., complete training, earning certification, etc.)

Salary Administration

Solution tracks cumulative incentive points earned

Salary Administration

As a Payroll Administrator, I review all incentive pay changes

A) Per multiple bargaining unit agreements, the starting of incentives are tracked and requested by the employee’s department by submitting a Personnel Action

Form along with supporting documentation (e.g., degree or certification).

Human Resources/Payroll ensures the incentive is programmed, reviews the documents received and enters the incentive into the financial system making certain that the incentive is applied correctly via the bargaining unit agreement language. Some incentives may have an expiration date due to requalification requirements and those expiration dates need to be tracked. Each bargaining unit agreement has its own incentive requirements outlined along with the value of the incentive.

The incentive value may be a dollar figure or a percentage. Some incentives calculate as a percentage from a specific job classification’s pay grade step rate

(e.g., incentive is 5% of Firefighter-Medic job class step 6). The incentive may be awarded via a training agency points program, degree/diploma or certification acquired.

Each incentive should have its own naming convention and the ability to track the accumulation of points, certificates, or degrees/diplomas.

The incentives are eligible to both, hourly and salary employees. The incentive pay value will need to be applied according to their pay type as hourly or salary.

There are two types of incentives, compounded to base and added to base. They are recognized by their own code. Compounded to base (e.g., CB) are those incentives regarding education and/or training combination recognized as being a part of the base pay, per bargaining unit agreement. The value of the incentive increases based on each level of completion that is outlined in the bargaining unit agreement. These incentives are calculated separately and then added to the employee’s pay grade step rate to give a base rate. The added to base (e.g., AB) incentives are calculated from that base rate, separately, and then are added to the base rate for a combined total gross hourly pay rate or salary amount.

An employee may qualify for several added to base incentives, however, there may be a maximum value detailed in the bargaining unit agreement that they are not to exceed. These “extra” incentives are still active and can replace any other incentives within that group that may expire or end date to maintain that maximum value.

The incentives need to be recognized and/or modified by a single or multiple bargaining unit people group number, job classification title or a position code.

The end date of an incentive may be due to an expiration date, or the employee no longer qualifies for the incentive due to a job duty change. This process is again tracked by the department and another Personnel Action Form is sent into

Human Resources/Payroll for review and to stop the incentive pay on the employee’s record in the financial system.

11. Q) Is the City willing to provide an extension to the RFP due date?

A) The City did provide an extension to the RFP due date of one week from the initial due date (see Supplemental Information Letter No. 1).

12. Q) Will Chart of Accounts re-design be completed before the start of the project or will re-design be part of the project?

A) Yes, a chart of accounts redesign would be part of this project.

13. Q) How many bargaining units do you have?

A) The City has 5 collective bargaining units. There are also several people groups that are not represented.

14. Q) Is the expectation to track Position Budgeting within the Financials application, Human Resources, or Budgeting application?

A) Position budgeting would be tracked within the budget application.

15. Q) There is a requirement for the ability to produce the reports required for the ACFR. Is that requirement specific to the data or for the ACFR or also for the compilation of the full document?

A) This requirement is referencing the data. The ERP system should be able to produce statements and tables used in the ACFR. Currently many of those are manually prepared.

16. Q) When training complexity necessitates documentation or online help, is there a requirement to have some or all of this documentation within the ERP application or could it be stored in a separate document storage application (e.g., SharePoint).

A) The preference is that the help is integrated within the solution itself. However, if that is not feasible, providing a space for external links would be acceptable.

17. Q) In the reference to Attachment 9 Work Effort (tab: Professional Service Payment

Detail), would you confirm the breakdown should be per individual? i.e. if we have 6 consultants all engaged in Phase 1 Design, should a row be created for each consultant? Would it be possible to provide an example of what is intended?

A) If multiple of the same resource role / name will be used, those hours can be combined into 1 row. For example, if 6 consultants will be used in Phase 1 Design for 20 hours per week for 8 weeks, 960 (20 x 8 x 6) can be entered in one row.

18. Q) On page 37 it states:

It is the City’s intent to award Agreements in substantially the form of the Agreement attached as Appendix A. Proposer may submit an alternative Agreement for City’s review. The City, at its sole determination, may approve the proposer’s offered

Agreement as is, require modifications, or reject the proposer’s Agreement and require that the City’s Agreement be executed for the purpose of this RFP.

However, appendix A is the Future Concept Maps. Can you please direct us to the correct Agreement?

A) This paragraph will be deleted from the request for proposal. Contracts will be reviewed at the time of contract negotiation.

19. Q) General: RFP Section 3: Proposal Submittal Requirements, Regarding the various

Attachments (1-17), would you prefer the Attachments to be inserted into our

Proposal document or kept separate (supplied via zip file) outside of the main

Proposal?

A) Word attachments can be inserted directly into the proposal. Excel attachments should be sent separate as part of the submission package. For Excel attachments, please include the Excel version and a PDF version.

20. Q) Functional: RFP: Section 1-1.1.6, please provide a list of your financial institutions and the number of operational bank accounts.

A) US Bank- 2 checking accounts with integration of 1 bank account for payments received for our AR/Project Accounting invoices.

21. Q) Functional: Attachment 17: #866-879: Does the City of Salem use a city-issued employee expense/travel card, or are all employee expenses paid by the employee and then reimbursed?

A) The City currently reimburses employees for approved work-related expenses.

The City does not issue credit cards to each employee. Each department is issued cards that has multiple authorized users used for expenses and travel under

$5,000.

22. Q) Functional: RFP: Section 1-1.1.4 Table 5 – Process Scope: How many locations will the City of Salem be taking inventory for?

A) The ERP system will need to draw in data and value inventory for 4 locations.

23. Q) Functional: RFP: Section 1-1.1.4 Table 5 – Process Scope: How many PAR inventory locations does the City of Salem have?

A) The City doesn’t have inventory/products that were automatically refilled at the warehouse.

24. Q) Technical: Attachment 14: Conversions: How much history (in years) will be converted from your legacy systems?

A) The preference would be to convert all historical data. However, if that is not technically feasible or is cost prohibitive, we would be open to converting a subset of our historical data, for example the last 5 years of data. If all of the historical data is not transferred, a legacy reporting system that includes at a minimum details regarding employees, employment, and bi-weekly payrolls would be needed.

25. Q) Technical: Attachment 14: Conversions: How many data sources/systems will the converted data be extracted from?

A) The primary expectation is that converted ERP data will only be extracted from our existing legacy ERP system.

26. Q) Timeline: RFP: Does the City of Salem have any brown/blackout durations which we should consider while formulating the project plan?

A) None are known at this time.

27. Q) Change Management: RFP: Given the magnitude of the changes identified by PIT teams and with the pending ERP, what is the City's estimated level of resistance to change/adoption of new technology?

A) For the most part, staff is excited about the possibility of efficiency and improvement a new ERP system will provide. The City’s project team will be focused on change management within the organization to help staff adopt the new system and associated process changes.

28. Q) Change Management: RFP: What is the City’s degree of maturity around Employee

Self-Service/Manager Self-Service?

A) The City has been gradually implementing various Employee Self-

Service/Manager Self-Service solutions. These implementations have been outside of our existing ERP system, mainly through custom solutions and within other enterprise applications. Examples of implemented Self-Service solutions include time entry, electronic paystub/W2, and employee electronic forms.

29. Q) General Approach: Do you prefer a phased implementation where either HCM or

Financials are deployed one before the other or a consolidated timeline where everything is delivered at once?

A) It is preferred to have both the HCM and the Financials functions delivered/deployed at the same time. However, we are interested in hearing about alternative implementation options, including phased implementation.

30. Q) General Approach: Do you have a preferred project start date?

A) Based on the current project plan, implementation would begin in January 2025.

31. Q) General Approach: Do you have a preferred go live dates for HCM, Financials, or both at once?

A) It is preferred to have both the HCM and the Financials functions delivered/deployed at the same time. However, we are interested in hearing about alternative implementation options, including phased implementation.

32. Q) General Approach: Is US Bank your P-Card provider?

A) Yes, currently US Bank is the City’s P-Card provider. The City will be issuing a banking RFP soon and the results of the successful respondent are unknown at this time.

33. Q) Section 1.1.2 – Accounting: Will the Salem Housing Authority only be on the

Financials side of the new ERP system or will there need to be configuration on the

HCM side as well?

A) The Salem Housing Authority (SHA) uses their own accounting system that is separate from the City’s system, but they are a blended component unit in the

City’s ACFR. The City does manage recruitments, employee records, and process payroll for SHA.

34. Q) Section 1.1.2 – Accounting: Will the Salem Housing Authority need to be configured as a separate legal entity?

A) The Salem Housing Authority is a separate legal entity from the City, but SHA uses their own segregated accounting system. The City accounting system does have a fund set up for SHA in order to execute and transfer payroll to the general ledger in the system. This could change if the fund was not required to process payroll in a new system.

35. Q) Section 1.1.7 – Asset Management: We understand that you want to centralize your policies and procedures for asset management. On your Interface list, we see

AssetWorks and CityWorks. Do you have any other work order solutions that should be integrated to the new ERP system?

A) Those are the work order systems that interface with the existing ERP. One other interface that might be worth exploring is with Alloy to transfer timekeeping data.

36. Q) Section 2.9.1 – Project Management Methodology (#5 Deployment & Post-

Production Phase): Please describe how much support you are expecting beyond the

Post-Production phase, which will include the first month-end close. For example, are you expecting full support throughout the first year leading up to and through year-end closure or are you expecting support as needed throughout the first year and assistance with the first year-end close?

A) Depending on the solution, if our technical team can access the backend of the system, we anticipate gaining sufficient knowledge to provide the necessary support. Therefore, we expect to manage support needs effectively, including the first month-end close and beyond, based on the system’s complexity and the training provided.