Amendment_1_Questions_&_Responses_693JK418R500002.pdf

Amendment No. 1 to

Solicitation No. 693JK418R500002

1. The document states on page 13, Task 1.c “Temperature strips. The collection container and one shipping bottle shall have affixed to it a temperature strip.” Most collection kits include a temperature strip only on the collection container since that is where the specimen is collected before being poured off into a shipping vial. Please confirm if a temperature strip is also required to be affixed to the shipping vial as stated. Specimens will more than likely be too cool to register a temperature when poured into a shipping vial.

ANSWER: Yes, the additional strip is used as a backup in the event the temperature strip on the collection container is compromised in some way or destroyed.

2. The document states on page 14, Task 1.h “Shipping containers. Must be a box sealed in plastic or shrink wrap to prevent the possibility of undetected tampering. Each box should be preprinted with a “certified drug-free” label. Boxes shall have a secure sealing method for shipping collection supplies from the collection site to the contractor.” For sealing the boxes when shipping to the laboratory, will a red tamper evident seal suffice if boxes are then placed in a mailing lab pack?

ANSWER: Yes, however you need to have a secure sealing method for the mailing of the lab pack.

3. For item H.3 on page 36: All laboratory employees are required to sign a confidentiality agreement prohibiting disclosure of all protected information upon hire. Will providing this document satisfy this requirement in lieu of the contract specific non-disclosure included in the solicitation?

ANSWER: No. The specific Non-Disclosure agreement that is included in the Solicitation must be signed, and must be submitted to DOT, by all Contractor personnel who will be personally and substantially involved in the performance under this Contract; and such submittal must be accomplished prior to each individual’s commencement of any work.

4. Page 59, Small Business Sub-Contracting plan. Will proposals that do not include a qualifying small business subcontracting plan be disqualified?

ANSWER: Each and every prospective prime offeror shall make a good-faith effort to fully investigate the possibility of incorporating, into its proposal submitted to DOT in response to this Solicitation, an explicit company-naming and pricing-out of at least one small business subcontractor, even if that sub or those subs would function merely in an ancillary and / or non-technical and / or administrative-support capacity. Further, each and every prime offeror shall describe, in the Subcontracting Plan section of the prime offeror’s proposal submitted to DOT under this Solicitation, the efforts made by the prime offeror to find such a small business sub or subs. Further, each and every prime offeror who was not able to find any small-business-subcontractor(s) shall explicitly confirm that point, in the Subcontracting Plan portion of the offeror’s proposal submitted to DOT under this Solicitation. No prime offeror whose proposal complies with all of the foregoing instructions will be excluded from the competition under this procurement, even if the offeror’s proposal does not include any small-business subcontracting.

But DOT does hereby reserve the right to use offerors’ amounts of proposed small-business-subcontracting-participation as a tie-breaking factor in the selection process, to the extent authorized in the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR), and to the extent authorized in other applicable Federal regulations and in Federal case law, and to the extent that any tie-breaking might hereafter become necessary or proper.”]

5. On page 44, Section H.17, for item (l) “The contractor shall immediately notify the contracting officer when an employee terminates employment that has access to DOT information systems or data.”: May this requirement be limited only to the testing laboratory personnel?

ANSWER: No. Because of the worldwide persistence of hacking-attempts and other forms of IT fraud and malfeasance, the maintenance of IT security has attained an urgency not confined to any particular category or class of IT-user.

6. Please clarify the time frame required to provide proficiency testing reports. Page 21, Task 15 states “A copy of all ratings received in each proficiency-testing program which, pursuant to Task 3 the contractor has participated in or is participating in, starting from within two years prior to the effective contract date and continuing throughout the term of the contract;” and page 69 states “Volume I, Tab 6: Performance Testing Results Provide results of Performance testing including specimen validity testing for the 12-month period ending on May 31, 2017.

Include a list of adulterants and confirmation capabilities.”

ANSWER:

1. Proficiency testing reports and Performance Testing Results are two separate requirements with different timeframes.

2. Proficiency Testing Reports: A copy of all ratings received in each proficiency -testing program which, pursuant to Task 3 the contractor has participated in or is participating in, starting from within two years prior to the effective contract date and continuing throughout the term of the contract.

3. Performance Testing Results: Provide results of Performance testing including specimen validity testing for the 12-month period ending on May 31, 2017. Include a list of adulterants and confirmation capabilities.

7. Please clarify the number of hard copies required for submission for volumes 1 and 2. Please clarify the number of electronic copies required for submission and if volumes 1 and 2 are to be included on each CD or if they are to be on separate CD’s. The solicitation references different volumes throughout (The first page indicates a total of 11 where elsewhere it references 12-13).

ANSWER: A. Subject to the exception for Past Performance appraisals stated in part C of this Answer 7, each offeror shall provide, to DOT, twelve complete electronic copies of its proposal, but each electronic copy of the proposal shall be broken out into two separate CD’s (one CD for the offeror’s Volume 1 proposal, and a separate CD for the offeror’s Volume 2 proposal).

Therefore, each offeror will be submitting 12 x 2 = 24 separate CDs to DOT. B. Subject to the exception stated in part C of this answer 7, each offeror shall provide, to DOT, one complete hard-paper original and eleven complete hard-paper copies of volumes 1 and 2 of the offeror’s proposal. C. However, each offeror is allowed to provide, to DOT, only one original (probably on paper), and no copies, of each Past Performance appraisal which the appraiser has insisted on sealing.

8. Will questions be accepted beyond the November 14th deadline (7 days after solicitation issue date)?

ANSWER: DOT is not promising to answer any questions submitted to DOT after the question-submittal-deadline specified in the Solicitation

9. Please clarify the approximate date on which questions and answers will be posted on Fed BizOpps.

ANSWER: Any prospective offeror reading this Amendment No. 1 would doubtless agree that its November 21st publication-date is proven beyond cavil by the date-stamp shown in FedBizOpps.

This Amendment No. 1 provides no further answers or clarifications regarding the subject drug-testing Solicitation.

James H. Mowery III Contracting Officer November 21, 2017