506333 Exhibit B - Proposal Response.docx

506333 Proposal Response: Electronic Payment Processing Solution

Proposer’s Information

Proposer hereby acknowledges receipt of Addenda number(s) through .

To be considered for selection, a duly authorized agent of the Proposer must complete and sign this page and submit it with the Proposal. Signature below indicates that the Proposer has read and understands the requirements set forth in this Request for Proposals (RFP).

Signature:

Table of Contents

TAB 1: MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS

The Proposer must complete this form as a part of the RFP response. If the answer to any of the below minimum qualification questions in this section is “No”, the proposal will not be considered for award.

1. Has your company completed the SSAE 16 report (or a more recent report)?

Provide details identifying the auditing firm used and provide a copy of your certificate with the proposal.

☐ Yes ☐ No

2. Has your company completed the SOC 2 Type 2 report?

Complete the security Assessment Questionnaire attached with the RFP documents as Exhibit H and submit any necessary documentation.

☐ Yes ☐ No

3. Is your company PCI Compliant? At what level?

Identify the auditing firm and provide a copy of your latest attestation of compliance certificate.

☐ Yes ☐ No

TAB 2: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Proposer will insert its executive summary in this section and limit it to one page. The executive summary must include:

· Summary of business.

· Number of years in business and number of years providing Electronic Payment Processing services to clients.

· Number of clients your firm currently provides hosted electronic payment solutions for.

· Provide your client retention rate for each of the last five years. Provide specific percentages for each year.

· Company size including number of employees.

· List out all sister companies, joint ventures, 3rd party dependencies, outsourcing or subcontracting that will be involved in creating and delivering the solution. Include business/financial and technical contacts for each organization listed.

· Describe the mergers/acquisitions your company has gone through in the last ten (10) years related to the services proposed.

· Business portfolio.

TAB 3: SUPPLEMENTAL QUESTIONS

All proposals must include a detailed response to all supplemental questions in this tab. The quality and detail of responses will figure significantly in the overall evaluation of proposals. Proposers are encouraged to provide additional information to support capabilities on each point. In an effort to standardize the format of all proposals, responses should be provided to all items in the order given. Please list each item number and restate the question before each individual response.

Proposer responses to this Tab 3 shall be limited to 25 pages. Proposal responses that are submitted over the 25 page limit will only be evaluated for the first 25 pages.

1) Experience and Expertise:

A. Firm Experience and Expertise

i. Describe your firm’s experience in providing similar processing services for other clients.

ii. Has your firm performed any work for Denver Water in the past?

iii. Describe any unique characteristics of your company and services that will present a benefit to Denver Water above and beyond your competitors.

B. Staff Experience and Expertise

i. How much of your organization’s capacity (facilities, software or staff) will be needed to support this opportunity? Describe how your application/infrastructure can handle increasing transaction/user volumes.

C. Vendor Management

i. Please describe communication protocols for data exchange between our organization and yours.

ii. Please describe the process and timeline for Denver Water to make changes once the service is up and running.

iii. Do you offer a dedicated account manager or technical success manager?

iv. How do you handle incident reporting and communications to customers?

2) Technical:

A. Enhancements

i. Describe any significant service offering enhancements made in the last 12 months; in the last 36 months.

ii. Describe any significant service offering enhancements that are upcoming and/or planned for the next one (1) to three (3) years.

iii. Describe your solution’s ability to integrate with Oracle JD Edwards Enterprise One (latest version) and Oracle Customer Care and Billing (CC&B) version 2.9.

iv. Describe how your system would facilitate Denver Water seamlessly taking advantage of system enhancements on an ongoing basis.

v. How do you inform customers about upcoming updates or major changes?

B. CSR Interface

i. Do you offer a solution for our CSRs to accept and research payments? Is this a single tool that covers all payment channels and payment methods? Please provide a detailed response.

ii. Describe the interface security, fraud prevention and verification/validation tools that are deployed by your service.

iii. Specify any specific software that must be purchased to implement this service. All costs associated with the latter must be included in the Proposer’s proposal, under Section 6 – Proposed Pricing / Fee Schedule.

iv. Describe how your system tracks usage by our associates/CSRs.

v. Describe how CSRs enroll customers into EBP and recurring payments from the agent tool during a call to help customers that do not have web access.

vi. Describe the user administration capabilities for internal users of the CSR interface. Can access levels be completely tailored to the users’ needs by us?

vii. What options does your solution have for CSR’s to accept payment via phone, PBT, or manage autopay without having to access cardholder data?

viii. Describe the tools to be used by our personnel in tracking bills and payments. Does your solution support the use of a common CSR, reporting and management tool across all billing and payment channels? Describe the functions that are supported.

C. Roles

i. How does the solution implement Role-Based Access Control (RBAC)? Include details on how user roles are defined, assigned, and managed.

ii. Describe the lowest level of role assignment. Can user roles be customized at the feature, field, or record level?

iii. Is every change to a role and assignment logged and auditable?

D. Browser

i. What are the minimum recommended browser requirements for end users? Please specify any known limitations or required plug ins for older browser versions.

ii. Provide details on how new browsers and browser versions are tested and certified.

E. Customizations

i. What are the customization options available, and how do they impact the overall cost and timeline?

ii. Describe which features within the solution are configurable.

iii. Are there any low-code or no-code customization capabilities?

iv. Do customizations require professional services from your team, or can they be done in-house?

v. Describe how the solution can be customized to meet each customer’s specific branding.

F. Platform

i. How do you support integration with other systems and platforms we currently use?

ii. Describe the core technology stack, including cloud provider, programming languages, frameworks, and databases.

iii. Is the cloud environment single-tenant or multi-tenant?

iv. How are technical maintenance and upgrades tasks handled to minimize service interruptions?

v. Describe your high-availability architecture and redundancy approach to avoid single points of failure.

vi. How do you monitor and scale your solution to accommodate spikes in usage or long-term growth?

vii. Can you provide performance benchmarks or stress testing results under typical and peak loads?

viii. What monitoring tools and performance metrics do you provide to customers?

ix. How do you approach feature requests, and what does your product roadmap look like for the next 12–24 months?

x. Describe the product release schedule. What level of testing is expected of existing customers? Can a customer skip a release?

xi. What logging capabilities does the system provide, e.g., user login, user logout, failed user login attempt, user actions, and configuration changes.

xii. How can logs be accessed by customers, and do you offer real-time monitoring dashboards or alerts?

xiii. Do you support integration with Microsoft Sentinel (SIEM) for incident detection and response?

xiv. Describe the application environments used during initial implementation.

xv. Describe the application environments available after go-live. If non-production environments are not available 24/7, describe the process for a customer to gain access.

xvi. What support channels are available (phone, email, ticketing system), and what are their hours of operation?

xvii. What are your average response times and resolution times for technical support?

xviii. After an incident has been resolved, do you provide post-mortem reports that detail root cause analysis and corrective actions?

xix. What is your escalation process for critical or high-severity issues?

xx. Does the solution provide REST APIs?

xxi. Describe the API authentication methods.

xxii. Describe your API catalog.

xxiii. How comprehensive is your API documentation, and do you offer SDKs or developer tools?

xxiv. Do you offer out-of-the-box integrations with Oracle’s Customer Care and Billing (CC&B)?

xxv. Describe data export capabilities.

xxvi. Can your solution support direct integration with Power BI?

3) Functional:

A. Platform Requirements

i. Are there any device requirements, browser requirements, or application requirements to view or pay bills?

ii. Is there any specific software that must be purchased in conjunction with your proposed solution? If applicable, please explain and specify the cost(s) and model number(s).

iii. Please provide a detailed diagram of the flow of information within the proposed solution. Be specific about which flows are real-time vs. batch processes.

B. Electronic Payment Processing

i. When can a first-time user make a payment on your service? Specifically address weekend and holiday availability.

ii. We require that our customers sign up for recurring payments and e-bill through Denver Water’s customer self-service application. What options does your solution provide for cost effective payment options?

iii. Specify the methods of payment your solution supports. Does your solution include all card associations and ATM networks?

iv. How does your system accommodate a customer interested in future dating their payment(s)?

v. What payment types do you support? Specify by channel (e.g., one-time, enrolled, scheduled, recurring).

vi. How does your solution present bill data, such as due dates and amount due to consumers?

vii. Describe the authorization and validation methods you recommend to ensure data integrity and reduction in errors and fraud.

viii. Describe your controls as well as the integration of Denver Water rules to support the blocking of specific users. How does your service allow us to update the blocking of specific users or payment types without your intervention? How does your solution identify and eliminate duplicate transactions?

ix. Describe how your solution supports mobile services for each of the following: mobile-friendly version of web payment page, downloadable application, and SMS.

x. Describe your offering(s) for outbound payment reminders/alerts. How are these alerts delivered.

xi. Provide unique features of your payment processing services, systems, and technologies.

xii. What are the solution options for payments that are over $1M (6-12 payments expected annually)? What are the fees associated with payments this large?

xiii. How does your solution handle blocking certain payment types for individual users?

C. Pay by Phone/IVR

i. Do you provide a dedicated toll-free number? If yes, please provide.

ii. Can the IVR prompts be customized for our identity? Can the call flow be customized?

iii. How do you support an opt-out link back to our call center from your hosted IVR?

iv. Specify which languages you support on your IVR.

v. Are scripts reviewed by fluent speakers for accuracy?

vi. Describe the method(s) to exchange data between your IVR solution and ours (e.g., sending account information).

vii. How does your voice recording technology for ACH authorization comply with NACHA regulations?

viii. What technology is used for the IVR, e.g. dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF), voice, natural language processing? How does this technology support accessibility concerns?

ix. Can the IVR check account statuses?

x. Can the IVR report outages without agent involvement?

xi. Can you support warm handoff for secure payments?

xii. Do you integrate with Genesys Pure Cloud?

xiii. Can you support secure payments taken from another source (Genesys integrated with a secure payment provider)?

D. Customer Self Service

i. What account information will a customer be able to manage?

ii. How does this technology support accessibility functionality concerns?

iii. What languages do you support (including AI Roadmap)?

iv. Can your solution support unlimited customer accounts or properties under a single log-in?

v. How do you ensure ongoing accessibility compliance as features evolve or UI changes are made?

vi. How is your solution configurable to allow feature additions or adjustments in the future without requiring major custom development?

vii. How many accounts can be supported under one user?

E. Online Payments at your Website

i. What are the different types of online payments offered by your solution? Explain processes available for each type of applicable fees.

a) How does your solution differentiate between water sales and non-water sales?

ii. Does your organization host the webpage(s) and support the web infrastructure of the application?

iii. Do you support responsive web design? If so, please elaborate.

iv. How does the customer access the web interface? Please describe.

v. Is the web interface configurable? If so, please elaborate.

vi. Describe your recurring credit card payment solution including how it would interface with Denver Water.

vii. What strategies do you use to increase autopay adoption?

viii. Describe what solution options are available for customers to customize autopay plans including split payments across multiple users and on a percentage basis.

ix. Can your system support other methods for one-time guest payment to identify themselves other than customer ID and account number? E.g. combination of phone number, name, address, email address, etc.

F. Electronic Billing and Payment (“EBP”) Overview

i. Describe your electronic billing solution and capabilities.

ii. Please describe the unique features of your EBP solution, systems, and technologies.

iii. What file or data formats does your solution accept as inputs for electronic billing?

iv. Can multiple e-Bills be presented each month?

v. Does the solution allow customers to view previous bills? How much billing history will our customers be able to see?

vi. Can multiple users access the same account under their own profiles for both viewing e-bills and payment (e.g. property management, duplex, multiple individuals in the same household, landlord/tennant)?

vii. How are credits or customer payment disputes handled?

viii. What strategies do you provide to increase e-Bill adoption?

ix. What is your firm’s experience with processing EDI billing and transactions?

x. Describe the user experience for adding and updating payment methods within the e-Bill.

xi. What common roadblocks do customer report having with using e-Bill?

G. Biller Direct EBP

i. Is your e-bill solution push based or pull based?

ii. Specify the bill output/download options that are offered by your service (HML, XML, Excel, Text, PDF, etc.).

iii. Describe the level of flexibility we would have to customize the look and feel of the pages (to meet our branding requirements and preferences).

iv. How will your proposed solution address information traditionally provided as bill inserts?

v. Does your solution offer the ability to include links, ads and conditional logic based on customer data?

vi. How does your solution accommodate links to our home page, customer service, biller FAQs, etc.?

vii. How will your solution address variations in the bill length, i.e. multiple pages?

viii. Please describe all channels in which your solutions can leverage e-bills for viewing and payment (e.g., Web, mobile etc.).

ix. Describe any next generation features specific to your e-bill presentment solution?

x. What wallet solutions do you integrate with, e.g. Google, Apple, PayPal, Venmo?

xi. Describe the payment journey through an e-Bill for Denver Water customers.

H. User Enablement

i. What alerts and/or communications are sent to the customer using your EBP service?

ii. When is the bill available to be viewed by the consumer and how long will it be available for them to view?

iii. How soon can a consumer request (through Denver Water’s Customer Self-Service Portal) be activated after notice has been received by your firm?

iv. What options exist for information on e-Billing activations? Describe what kind of reporting exists for this (daily, weekly, real time, etc.).

I. Consumer Alerts and Notifications

i. Describe your options for consumers to be notified that a new e-Bill is available for review.

ii. In addition to e-Billing notifications, outline your capabilities to generate specific alerts or notifications based upon other triggers.

iii. What are some roadblocks that your system has encountered for customer facing links?

J. Client Management/Support Tools

i. How will our CSRs see when a bill was delivered and viewed by a customer?

ii. Will our CSRs have the ability to see the consumer’s bill exactly as the consumer sees it? Will the CSR be able to view the bill concurrently with the customer? Please describe in detail.

K. Marketing and Electronic Communication Capabilities

i. Please describe your solution’s ability for us to manage electronic communications to our customers through a variety of channels. Specify the channels and clarify whether these capabilities are self-service or if they require your involvement to execute.

ii. What capabilities are available for us to evaluate the results of these types of outbound campaigns?

iii. Describe any reporting your service provides to compare the success of various campaigns?

L. Operational Capabilities – Remittance and Funding

i. Are you able to consolidate remittance and settlement for payments across channels (online, phone, mobile, walk-in/retail stores, SMS etc.) and/or other third-party acceptors? Please describe it in detail. What are our choices of file formats to receive this remittance data for upload into our systems?

ii. Describe how payments are processed from start to finish. The start of the process is the receipt of payment and the end of the process is the point funds are deposited into the Denver Water’s bank account. What is the length of this process from start to finish?

iii. Will our funds be handled separately from your other clients? Explain the process.

iv. How are returned items handled and communicated back to us?

v. What types of processes are offered in order to accept refunds?

vi. What is your experience with a client transitioning from pre-set billing due dates to a customer selecting their own due date? How has this impacted cash flows for the organization?

M. Security

i. What security measures are in place to prevent unauthorized user access to either the system or the data?

ii. What security measures are in place to protect internet transactions?

iii. Describe the fraud prevention measures your company has in place.

iv. Describe the secure login options available through the solution.

v. What is your approach to data privacy and compliance?

vi. What encryption methods are used for data at rest and in transit?

vii. What is your policy on data ownership, and what happens to the data if/when we stop using the service?

viii. Where is a customer’s data physically stored, and do you offer data residency options?

ix. What is the data retention policy?

x. How do you manage data backups and retention, and how frequently are backups performed?

xi. How do you handle identity and access management, including user authentication and authorization?

xii. Describe your procedures to ensure compliance with current and ongoing legal and regulatory requirements.

4) Service Level and Support:

A. Business Continuity

i. Describe failover redundancy provided with your solution, such that any hardware failure does not disable the service.

ii. How often is your system tested for failover performance? When was the last test performed? What were the results?

iii. What are your disaster recovery procedures and facilities in case of service center failures?

iv. What are the disaster recovery and business continuity plan for the platform, including recovery time objectives (RTO) and recovery point objectives (RPO)?

v. What are the terms and conditions for service level agreements (SLAs) and uptime guarantees? Please attach your SLA is available.

B. Quality Control

i. Provide examples of quality control and system monitoring.

ii. Describe your testing process both for initial implementation and any ongoing service enhancements.

iii. What controls exist to maintain your system reliability?

iv. What is the history of service outages during the preceding 36 months? What was the cause? What has been done to harden the solution so that outages are minimized?

v. Please provide quantified data supporting the number, duration and severity of outages in the past 12 months. Past 60 months.

C. Reporting and Business Intelligence

i. Describe the standard reports available to us and the method by which our staff would access the data. What is the standard delivery time frame?

ii. What ad hoc reporting capabilities are offered in your reports suite? Please describe.

iii. What access to reporting or reporting components can be controlled at the user level based on permissions as dictated by our business rules?

iv. Describe the out-of-the-box reporting capabilities.

v. What are the historical data limitations for reporting? How far back can reporting go to facilitate reporting or trend analysis?

D. Client Support

i. Describe your method for ensuring timely, clear, and thorough communication with your clients.

ii. Describe your implementation plan and schedule including roles. Include:

i. Key tasks;

ii. Milestones;

iii. Rollout Phases;

a) Assistance with Intuitive Tap Portal (top priority for Denver Water).

b) Proposer’s recommendation for the remainder of the work.

iv. Deliverables; and

v. Designated Denver Water and Consultant responsibilities.

iii. Describe all training that the Proposer will provide during the course of this project, including training methods, cost and training topics. Include support options and the associated cost(s) with descriptions.

iv. What resources will be required of Denver Water to maintain, administer and monitor your solution?

v. What online self-service tools are available to us for look-up, research, reporting, etc.?

vi. If multiple services are selected, will each channel/service require a separate tool and login?

vii. How do you address system accessibility and functionality by our staff to be restricted to meet our needs?

viii. Describe the technical support capabilities, available hours and time zone, how the issues are tracked, and the escalation process. What software tool is used for this process?

ix. What promotional materials and marketing support do you offer to increase adoption of the proposed services? Describe the additional costs associated with these programs.

x. Please describe any support services or tools that your service offers to assist with exception handling and treasury functions.

xi. Please explain the process for how client requested solution changes are handled. What is the timeframe from the request to having the change live in productions? Do you assign a business analysis based on the type of change requested? Do you have a process for release management? Do you have scheduled blackout periods and if so when do those occur? What is your escalation process?

xii. What is your product roadmap for the next 1-3 years?

xiii. How do you handle partnership and collaboration with clients?

xiv. What documentation is provided for the platform, and how is it kept up to date?

xv. How do you solicit feedback from your clients?

xvi. How are clients notified of updates, changes, or new features?

xvii. What service level do you provide to customers to resolve issues that have already been identified and reported? Are there different response time expectations based on the priority level of the reported issue?

RFP Response No. 506333 Electronic Payment Processing Solution

REV 12/27/20

TAB 4: PROFESSIONAL REFERENCES

Provide a minimum of three customer references that purchased services described in this RFP within the past five years. When possible, provide references for government and/or water utility companies.

REFERENCE 1

REFERENCE 2

REFERENCE 3

TAB 5: PROPOSAL RATES

Proposers must describe its rate structure and submit its comprehensive price within Exhibits C and D. Please specify the percentage of overhead that is included in your proposed pricing.

Proposers must include a list of the subcontractors that will be used to perform the work, including subcontractor’s name, business address, contact name, contact phone number and contact e-mail address.

TAB 6: SUPPLIER DIVERSITY SURVEY

Section 2.14 of the RFP describes Denver Water’s Supplier Diversity Program: Small Business Enterprise (SBE) / Minority/Women Business Enterprise (MWBE). The data from this form is used for Denver Water’s records only. This data supports consolidated reporting for the Supplier Diversity Program and is used for the purpose of analyzing general business patterns such as representation and participation of small, minority, and/or women business enterprises within industries that do business with Denver Water.

1) The Proposer is a self-attested small business per Small Business Administration size standards criteria OR is certified as a Small Business Enterprise (SBE).

|_| Yes |_| No

2) The Proposer is a certified a Minority-owned Business Enterprise (MBE) and/or certified Women-owned Business Enterprise (WBE).

|_| Yes |_| No By answering “Yes” to question 2, the Proposer must submit a copy of its valid MBE and/or MWBE certification(s) in this tab.

TAB 7: REQUIRED SUBMISSION DOCUMENTS AND INFORMATION

Confirm that you are submitting the following required submission documents and information in this tab. Attach all required additional submission documents between Tab 7 and Tab 8.

1) Colorado Secretary of State Certificate of Good Standing or equivalent |_| Yes |_| No

2) W-9 |_| Yes |_| No

3) Sample Insurance Certificate: Proposer must provide a sample Acord™ 25 Certificate of Liability Insurance form indicating Proposer’s coverage and limits of the types specified in Exhibit A: Sample Agreement |_| Yes |_| No

4) Proposer acknowledges and has satisfied requirements of RFP Section 3.4 Designation of Any Proprietary and Confidential Information |_| Yes, Proposer clearly designated any sentences, pages or sections of the Proposal that the Proposer deems confidential or proprietary, and included it as a separate file on the same e-mail, marked “REDACTED ORIGINAL”.

|_| No, Proposer did not designate any sentences, pages or sections of the Proposal confidential or proprietary. Proposers acknowledge that Denver Water may be required to disclose any or all of the documents submitted with a Proposal, pursuant to the Colorado Open Records Act, C.R.S. § 24-72-201.1, et seq.

5) Sample invoice |_| Yes |_| No

6) Proposer prefers to receive payment via the payment method indicated by a “YES” response in the Preferred Payment Method column (select only one option):

7) A completed Information Technology Industry Council (ITIC) Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT), also known as an Accessibility Compliance Report (ACR). If a VPAT is provided, it must use the VPAT 2.5 template, which is based on both WCAG 2.1 Level A/AA and WCAG 2.2. The ITIC offers a free VPAT 2.5 WCAG (November 2023).

|_| Yes |_| No

TAB 8: PROPOSER’S TERMS AND CONDITIONS

Proposer must insert the following in this tab, if applicable:

|_| Exceptions and/or proposed modifications to Exhibit A: Sample Agreement in accordance with RFP Section 2.10 Sample Agreement.

|_| The Proposer must submit all applicable policies or agreements for Denver Water’s consideration in accordance with RFP Section 2.11 Sample Agreement Conflicting Terms & Conditions. Additional agreements may include:

· End User License Agreement

· Privacy Policy

· Acceptable Use Policy

· Service Level Agreement

· Maintenance and Support Agreement image1.jpeg