QA for 23-R-00196 dated 9.15.23.xlsx

XLSX spreadsheet 19 KB Posted Sep 15, 2023

Attached to: Mike Monroney Aeronautical Center (MMAC) Admin Support Services
Solicitation number: 6973GH-23-R-00196
Issued by: Department of Transportation Federal Aviation Administration Franchise Acquisition Services

About this file

Written by GovTribe AI · Dec 21, 2023

This document contains questions and answers regarding solicitation number 6973GH-23-R-00196 for Mike Monroney Aeronautical Center (MMAC) Administrative Support Services. The Federal Aviation Administration seeks to award an Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity contract with a 60-month ordering period and six-month extension option to provide administrative support services at MMAC. The incumbent contractor is SIRCO IT, LLC. Services include technical writing, administrative support, and program management support to be performed onsite at MMAC. Pricing is to be submitted according to the fixed-price schedule provided, which estimates hours for evaluation purposes only. The award will be a 100% set-aside for 8(a) small businesses.

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Other files

File	Type	Posted
Tab 6 6973GH-23-R-00196 Amend 00001 dated 9.28.23.pdf	PDF	Sep 28, 2023
QA Rev. 1 for 23-R-00196 dated 9.28.23.xlsx	XLSX spreadsheet	Sep 28, 2023
Tab 6 Wage Determination 15_5315 Rev 21.pdf	PDF	Sep 28, 2023
Tab 3 SOW MMAC Admin Support 9.15.23.pdf	PDF	Sep 15, 2023
Seniority List - MMAC Admin Services Incumbent Personnel - Redacted.pdf	PDF	Sep 15, 2023
Tab 6 MMAC Admin Support Price Schedule (Matrix) 8.2.23.xlsx	XLSX spreadsheet	Aug 31, 2023
Tab 3 SOW MMAC Admin Support 7.5.23.pdf	PDF	Aug 31, 2023
Tab 6 Past Experience Form 8.3.23.docx	DOCX document	Aug 31, 2023
6973GH-23-R-00196 Final.pdf	PDF	Aug 31, 2023
Tab 6 Wage Determination 15_5315.pdf	PDF	Aug 31, 2023

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Sheet1

FAA SIR/Solicitation: 6973GH-23-R-00196 (MMAC Admin Support Services)
Questions & Answers dated 9.15.23
Question:	Are there currently any incumbents?
Answer:	Yes, SIRCO IT, LLC (SAM UEI No. NGSXYDMHX643).
Question:	The provided Price Matrix spreadsheet appears to be using 1,920 hours per year per FTE. This only includes 10 national holidays. Can Offerors adjust this to account for 11 holidays per year?
Answer:	No, the FAA needs all the proposals in the exact same pricing format for evaluation purposes. Please only fill in the green-shaded cells of the price matrix. Do NOT adjust the hours or any other cells unless the cell has green fill color. All federal holidays will be observed. Please NOTE the fully burdened rate per hour you propose for each labor category will be the rate placed on contract. Minor variations in the estimated hours per year may occur between now and contract award and each offeror should take this into consideration when it proposes its fully burdened rates per hour.
Question:	Is this contract an IDIQ?
Answer:	Yes, an IDIQ "D" type contract with a 60-month ordering period (no traditional options) and a six month service extension option is anticipated.
Question:	As the labor CLIN is T&M, can offerors adjust the number of hours per FTE to reflect 11 holidays and corporate/SCA PTO and sick leave amounts?
Answer:	No, the FAA needs all the proposals in the exact same pricing format for evaluation purposes. Please only fill in the green-shaded cells of the price matrix. Do NOT adjust the hours or any other cells unless the cell has green fill color. All federal holidays will be observed. Please NOTE the fully burdened rate per hour you propose for each labor category will be the rate placed on contract. Minor variations in the estimated hours per year may occur between now and contract award and each offeror should take this into consideration when it proposes its fully burdened rates per hour.
Question:	What are offerors supposed to price in the X002 Project Management and Support CLIN?
Answer:	This would be the price of having a full-time project manager at a FFP rate per month at the Mike Monroney Aeronautical Center (MMAC) to manage the program, contract compliance, any contractor personnel issues, etc. to ensure successful performance.
Question:	Section 12 of the SOW calls for a transition plan. Where should offerors include this plan in the proposal?
Answer:	The transition plan is part of performance of the contract IAW the SOW and would be done after award. It does not appear to be part of Section L or M of the SIR (but please double check); therefore, no transition plan would be required to be submitted with an offeror's proposal. Please ensure to follow Section L &M to the letter or risk having your company's proposal deemed unresponsive.
Question:	Is the transition plan subject to page count?
Answer:	The transition plan is part of performance of the contract IAW the SOW and would be done after award. It does not appear to be part of Section L or M of the SIR (but please double check); therefore, no transition plan would be required to be submitted with an offeror's proposal. Please ensure to follow Section L &M to the letter or risk having your company's proposal deemed unresponsive.
Question:	Section 11.2 of the SOW calls for a draft Quality Control plan. Where should offerors include this plan in the proposal?
Answer:	The quality control plan is also part of performance of the contract IAW the SOW and would be done after award. It does not appear to be part of Section L or M of the SIR (but please double check); therefore, no quality control plan would be required to be submitted with an offeror's proposal. Please ensure to follow Section L &M to the letter or risk having your company's proposal deemed unresponsive.
Question:	Is the draft Quality Control plan subject to page count?
Answer:	The quality control plan is also part of performance of the contract IAW the SOW and would be done after award. It does not appear to be part of Section L or M of the SIR (but please double check); therefore, no quality control plan would be required to be submitted with an offeror's proposal. Please ensure to follow Section L &M to the letter or risk having your company's proposal deemed unresponsive.
Question:	Are any of the current staff part-time personnel?
Answer:	No.
Question:	Is the Contract Program Manager required to be on-site at MMAC?
Answer:	Yes, the program manger is expected to work onsite at the MMAC.
Question:	How often will the Government issue orders under the IDIQ?
Answer:	Contract actions (e.g. orders and mods) could be sporadic and continuous as there are five organizations that need to be supported with unique requirements. Each will fund a separate order each calendar year and pay their share of the program manager cost.
Question:	What is the average size (FTEs, $$$) of each of the orders to be placed under the IDIQ?
Answer:	Unknown, it could vary quite a bit with some organizations only needing one support contractor and another needing eight support contractors, with others organizations in between.
Question:	Will orders under the IDIQ have incumbent personnel?
Answer:	There are incumbent personnel the awardee may consider hiring. This is not a mandate as relevant policy has currently not been fully implemented; however, it generally makes logical sense in follow-on support contracts to hire incumbent personnel if they have performed well on the prior contract. Please refer to the "Seniority List" that will be posted at the same time as the Q&A to SAM.gov for more information.
Question:	What is the planned duration of each of the orders expected to be placed under this IDIQ?
Answer:	Each order will have a PoP of one year and will be priced IAW the price schedule for the calendar year in which the order is issued.
Question:	SOW section 1.2 indicates multiple task orders may be issued, while the pricing sheet lists specific labor categories and hours. Please confirm that the labor categories are not expected to change, and the noted labor hours are for evaluation purposes only.
Answer:	The labor categories are not expected to change and the noted labor hours are for evaluation purposes only AND are an estimate at the same time. Please NOTE the fully burdened rate per hour you propose for each labor category will be the rate placed on contract. Minor variations in the estimated hours per year may occur between now and contract award and each offeror should take this into consideration when it proposes its fully burdened rates per hour.
Question:	Please provide the estimated number of annual task orders, requests, awards, typical length of a task order, and typical number of task orders that run congruently?
Answer:	Five orders per year for 12 months each is anticipated. It's expected the orders will run congruently, but not perfectly, as each customer may issue an order a little earlier or later. There could be order incremental funding mods or mods to the basic contract sporadically.
Question:	If location of work is directed outside the MMAC, will the contractor have the ability to request a price adjustment that accommodates the directed location?
Answer:	This should be rare with all direct labor work projected to be done at the MMAC. However, if work is directed by the contracting officer and it is not at the MMAC, there may be justification for a price adjustment and/or travel reimbursement, etc.
Question:	SOW section 1.2 notes “On-site contractor supervision” must be identified, please clarify if one of the positions listed in “Section 13” can act as this supervision, if not, then who must act as the supervisor, and is this position billable?
Answer:	The three labor categories in SOW Section 13 are support contractors and are NOT supervisors. There will need to be a full-time project manager onsite that should perform supervision as part of his or her duties. Please refer to the SOW and the price schedule/matrix.
Question:	Please clarify the current e-invoicing procedure? i.e. IPP, WAWF, etc.
Answer:	The FAA uses its own e-invoicing platform that is easy to setup and utilize. The awardee will be given instructions on how to gain access and can request assistance on how to use the system as needed.
Question:	Can the Government please provide examples of the kind of work expected of each position? E.g. administrative employees are typically responsible for light typing, calendar management, and greeting incoming visitors, however some administrative duties also include stocking supplies, office management, and record organization. Technical writers can be expected to create many different types of documents, please provide examples of the expectation of this position and the others required to support this effort.
Answer:	No, what is described in Section 13 of the SOW and what is available in the public domain to describe these labor categories and the knowledge and skills required is sufficient. Note there are incumbent personnel the awardee may consider hiring. This is not a mandate; however, it generally makes logical sense in follow-on support contracts to hire incumbent personnel if they have performed well on the prior contract. Please refer to the "Seniority List" that will be posted at the same time as the Q&A to SAM.gov for more information.
Question:	The Government provided Wage Determination 2015-5315, Revision 20 (12/27/2022). Revision 21 was released on 8/2/2023 that included changes to H&W along with pay rates for the Admin. Assistant and Technical Writer positions. Can the Government please confirm what Wage Determination should be used in response to this RFP?
Answer:	The bulk of the work/positions under this contract will be covered by the SCA (with the project manager exempt). Yes, your company should proposed using the latest and greatest applicable DOL Wage Determination (WD) rates as a reference. However, please note that the DOL WD rates are a minimum rate. It is up to the offeror to determine if the minimum rate is going to be enough to attract and maintain support contractors in the specific labor categories required. Also note that there are incumbent personnel your company may wish to hire and those individuals may currently make more than the minimum rate and may be unwilling to work for less. Please refer to the "Seniority List" that will be posted at the same time as the Q&A to SAM.gov for more information. All these factors must be considered. It is an LPTA source selection; however, bidding a price too aggressively low could cause major problems with performance so prudence is recommended. The FAA will not renegotiate the prices per hour if your company wins the award and will expect your company to perform successfully as proposed and IAW the contractual agreement.
Question:	There is a discrepancy between the SOW and the solicitation/SIR. The SOW’s Period of Performances has “This contract will consist of one (1) base year and four (4) option years. In addition, a six-month service extension option will be included in the contract." But, in the Solicitation it is based on 60 Month Ordering Period – NO Options and Solicitation’s Tab+6+MMAC+Admin+Support+Price+Schedule+(Matrix)+8.2., Period of Performances are based on Calendar Years (Years 1 through 5). Please advise what is the correct Period of Performance.
Answer:	The latter is correct, this will be an IDIQ "D" type contract with a 60-month ordering period (no traditional options) and a six month service extension option is anticipated. Pricing will be per calendar year IAW the price schedule/matrix. The SOW will be updated to reflect this correction and posted to SAM.gov at the same time as this Q&A is posted and shall be considered the "latest and greatest" version of the SOW (dated 9.15.23) to propose off of.
Question:	Will FAA allow additional pages to accommodate including the detailed phase-in plan OR allow for a summary phase-in plan, with the comprehensive phase-in plan due after award?
Answer:	No, the technical page limit is set and will remain unchanged. Only certain exceptions outlined in Section L or M will not count against the page limit(s). Contractors are highly encouraged to eliminate any and all "fluff" and possibly excessive white space in their proposal. And proposals must be readable so please avoid excessively small font. The transition plan and quality control plan will be required after award IAW the SOW. Please ensure to follow Sections L & M precisely.
Question:	Will FAA allow additional pages to accommodate including a full-blown quality control plan (SOW 11.2) OR allow for a detailed summary quality plan in the proposal, with the comprehensive quality control plan due 30 days after award, as stated in SOW 11.2?
Answer:	No, the technical page limit is set and will remain unchanged. Only certain exceptions outlined in Section L or M will not count against the page limit(s). Contractors are highly encouraged to eliminate any and all "fluff" and possibly excessive white space in their proposal. And proposals must be readable so please avoid excessively small font. The transition plan and quality control plan will be required after award IAW the SOW. Please ensure to follow Sections L & M precisely.
Question:	What is the contract number and who is the incumbent contractor currently performing these services?
Answer:	Contract No. 6973GH-18-D-00097. SIRCO IT, LLC (SAM UEI No. NGSXYDMHX643).
Question:	Are there incumbent employees currently performing these services? If so, please provide the service dates (original hire dates) so offerors are able to accurately calculate and price the SCA vacation requirements.
Answer:	Yes, there are incumbent employees/personnel performing these services. Please see the "Seniority List" that will be posted at the same time as this Q&A to SAM.gov.
Question:	Based on the hours stated on the price schedule it appears that the government is using 1,920 productive hours per full-time employee. This calculation does not appear to take into account the requirements of Executive Order 13706 which provides for up to 56 hours of paid sick leave per year for each SCA employee or the addition of Juneteenth as a paid federal holiday. It must be assumed that each employee will use at least a portion of those paid sick leave hours and most will take all of those hours and the paid holiday. This will reduce the number of billable hours worked by an SCA employee. If a burdened billable rate is calculated based on an employee working falsely assumed 1,920 billable hours, and then the employee works less billable hours due to usage of paid sick leave and the holiday, the true cost of the employee will not be recovered. We request that the FTE billable hours be adjusted to account for paid sick leave and the addition of the new federal holiday.
Answer:	The FAA needs all the proposals in the exact same pricing format for evaluation purposes. Please only fill in the green-shaded cells of the price matrix. Do NOT adjust the hours or any other cells unless the cell has green fill color. All federal holidays will be observed. Please NOTE the fully burdened rate per hour you propose for each labor category will be the rate placed on contract. Minor variations in the estimated hours per year may occur between now and contract award and each offeror should take this into consideration when it proposes its fully burdened rates per hour.
Question:	The SCA wage determination provided with the solicitation appears to be outdated. Please clarify.
Answer:	The bulk of the work/positions under this contract will be covered by the SCA (with the project manager exempt). Yes, your company should proposed using the latest and greatest applicable DOL Wage Determination (WD) rates as a reference. However, please note that the DOL WD rates are a minimum rate. It is up to the offeror to determine if the minimum rate is going to be enough to attract and maintain support contractors in the specific labor categories required. Also note that there are incumbent personnel your company may wish to hire and those individuals may currently make more than the minimum rate and may be unwilling to work for less. Please refer to the "Seniority List" that will be posted at the same time as the Q&A to SAM.gov for more information. All these factors must be considered. It is an LPTA source selection; however, bidding a price too aggressively low could cause major problems with performance so prudence is recommended. The FAA will not renegotiate the prices per hour if your company wins the award and will expect your company to perform successfully as proposed and IAW the contractual agreement.
Question:	What is the historic level of effort (in billed hours) utilized supporting MMAC under the current incumbent contract?
Answer:	The hours listed in the price schedule/matrix is the estimate the FAA is able to provide; however, there may be minor variations at the time of award as discussed in previous questions.
Question:	Is it anticipated that this new procurement will include a similar level of effort as experienced under the current contract?
Answer:	No, this follow-on contract will be smaller in scope than the current contract.
Question:	Reference paragraph 9.6 of the SOW – what is the historical cost associated with the contractor provided “general office supplies”?
Answer:	Historically speaking, the contractor has only needed to provide very limited office supplies. If needed and authorized by the contracting officer, the cost for office supplies could be billed to the contract at cost. Note that if this occurs it would be "incidental" as this contract is principally for support services. The FAA will provide office space, laptops, monitors, printers, etc.
Question:	On the SAM.gov posting, what does "100% set-aside for certified 8(a) small business" mean exactly?
Answer:	This means that only one (1) contract will be awarded and that the prime contractor must be an 8(a) certified small business. This does not mean that partnering/subcontracting is prohibited unless the SIR/solicitation specifically states so. Recommended potential offerors thoroughly review the SIR/solicitation for any limitations.
Question:	What is the anticipated award and start date of this project?
Answer:	The estimated start date is around February 2024. The estimated award date is anytime before this.
Question:	Is this a new contract? If not, please share the current contract details, awarded amount.
Answer:	No, this is a follow-on contract, however the scope of this contract will be smaller than the previous contract.
Question:	Estimated budget for this project?
Answer:	This is not a question that can be answered.
Question:	Can we use our subcontractor's past experience performed as prime to meet the mandatory requirement listed in evaluation factor 1?
Answer:	No you may not. Only prime contractor experience will be evaluated. Please ensure to follow Section L & M exactly.
Question:	Will the Government accept the proposal response from joint Ventures?
Answer:	The FAA will be focused on evaluating the prime contractor for this award IAW Section L & M. Unless specifically stated otherwise in the solicitation, and specifically Sections L & M, partnering/subcontracting is okay; however, the FAA will be looking specifically at the prime contractor's (and only the prime contractors) past experience and performance when doing evaluations.
Question:	Will the Government accept the past experience from one of the Joint Venture partners performed in the past as prime contractor?
Answer:	No, the FAA will only look at the past experience and performance of the prime contractor competing for the award IAW Section L & M.
Question:	As per the Evaluation criteria factor 1: "offeror should have experience with at least two (2) service contracts within the last 5 years as the prime contractor", however according to factor 2 past experience: "An assessment of past experience will be made to determine if it is recent. To be recent, the contractor must have performed within the last three (3) years from the date of issuance of this solicitation." Can you please clarify which one is correct?
Answer:	Factor 1 and Factor 2 are separate evaluation factors and this distinction is on purpose.
Question:	Can FAA please confirm that resumes are not required as part of the proposal submission?
Answer:	That is correct, there is no "Key Personnel" provision/clause related to this effort so no resumes are required.
Question:	The SOW requires the contractor to develop a transition plan. Please confirm that this requirement applies post-award and is not required for the technical proposal.
Answer:	Correct, the transition plan would be post award, unless it is specifically asked for in Section L & M. Please refer to previous questions/answers that are similar that have additional information.
Question:	Please clarify that this is an IDIQ contract. How many awards are expected?
Answer:	The resultant contract will be an IDIQ contract and only one award will be made to one contractor. Multiple orders based off of this one basic contract to the one awardee is anticipated.
Question:	Continuation Page only lists CLINS 0001, 0002, 0003, and 0004 and does not include the full 60 month ordering period. Please add the CLINS on the continuation page for the full ordering period.
Answer:	No, please utilize the price schedule/matrix to propose for evaluation purposes. It is possible the resultant contract could vary slightly from the SIR/solicitation due to tweaks done right before final award. These tweaks would not be of a kind to impact the outcome of the source selection.
Question:	Are the hours provided in the price schedule/matrix based on historical data or something else? Are offerors permitted to use their own determination of hours to accomplish the work?
Answer:	Estimated based on historical information. Do NOT use your own determination. Only fill in the green areas on the price schedule/matrix. This will be used for evaluation purposes. Refer to other Q&As on this sheet that may answer this question in greater detail.
Question:	How are offerors to determine the level of effort without a scope of work for the task order?
Answer:	The SIR/solicitation, SOW, Seniority List, and price schedule/matrix taken together provide an adequate outline for the expected scope of work.
Question:	Is Program Mgt support intended to support all tasks under the IDIQ or only for one task order? Please provide the scope of work for this CLIN 00001 Program Management & Support.
Answer:	The program manger or project manger will be a FTE that will support the entire program. Each task order from each organization will pay a pro-rated portion of the price/cost for this position.
Question:	SOW, Page 5, Item 1.4 states that this contract will consist of one base year and four option years plus an additional 6 month option will be included in the contract. This differs from the SIR/solicitation (cover page) which states "60 month ordering period - NO options). Please clarify the correct period of performance.
Answer:	This will be an IDIQ "D" type contract with a 60-month ordering period (no traditional options) and a six month service extension option is anticipated. Pricing will be per calendar year IAW the price schedule/matrix. The SOW will be updated to reflect this correction and posted to SAM.gov at the same time as this Q&A posting.
Question:	Does the IDIQ require Key Personnel? If so, please provide details.
Answer:	No. The closest thing to Key Personnel would be the program/project manager. However, the FAA has decided for streamline purposes, to not formally dictate this be a "Key Personnel" position.
Question:	Would the government please consider revising the Wage Determination to 2015-5315, Revision 21 dated 08/03/2023?
Answer:	The bulk of the work/positions under this contract will be covered by the SCA (with the project manager exempt). Yes, your company should proposed using the latest and greatest applicable DOL Wage Determination (WD) rates as a reference. However, please note that the DOL WD rates are a minimum rate. It is up to the offeror to determine if the minimum rate is going to be enough to attract and maintain support contractors in the specific labor categories required. Also note that there are incumbent personnel your company may wish to hire and those individuals may currently make more than the minimum rate and may be unwilling to work for less. All these factors must be considered. It is an LPTA source selection; however, bidding a price too aggressively low could cause major problems with performance so prudence is recommended. The FAA will not renegotiate the prices per hour if your company wins the award and will expect your company to perform successfully as proposed and IAW the contractual agreement.
Question:	The Government has incorporated Wage Determination 2015-5315 Rev. 20 as part of the solicitation package. Will the Government please confirm that the incorporated Wage Determination referenced above should be used in preparing the pricing in response to this SIR?
Answer:	The bulk of the work/positions under this contract will be covered by the SCA (with the project manager exempt). Yes, your company should proposed using the latest and greatest applicable DOL Wage Determination (WD) rates as a reference. However, please note that the DOL WD rates are a minimum rate. It is up to the offeror to determine if the minimum rate is going to be enough to attract and maintain support contractors in the specific labor categories required. Also note that there are incumbent personnel your company may wish to hire and those individuals may currently make more than the minimum rate and may be unwilling to work for less. All these factors must be considered. It is an LPTA source selection; however, bidding a price too aggressively low could cause major problems with performance so prudence is recommended. The FAA will not renegotiate the prices per hour if your company wins the award and will expect your company to perform successfully as proposed and IAW the contractual agreement.
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File details come from the government source that posted it. Updated Sep 15, 2023.