Solicitation Questions - 1.pdf

Questions - Correspondence Management Support for IHS - Notice ID: 75P00126Q00019

• Is this a new requirement? This is a new contract action, but the requirements are not new.

• If no, how many FTEs are currently staffed? There were 2

• Does this contract require travel? Local travel and parking are not covered; parking is not provided to contractors

• This is a FFP – LOE contract, I have heard of issue with the interpretation of LOE during the last year, so I am asking for clarification. I need to understand your interpretation so that I can calculate a fair and reasonable offer.

a. My interpretation of FFP – LOE is that the government agrees to pay a set rate for 2,080 hours annually, long as the position is staffed. This includes federal holidays, PTO, and sick time. Is this correct? Paid for hours worked.

b. Long as the positions are staffed, will the government require monthly reports of productive hours? Yes

• Is there a current contract providing these services or is this a new requirement?

Previous contract ended

• If there is a current contract, please provide the contract number and incumbent information. N/A

• Reference Solicitation Paragraph 1. Place of Performance; The paragraph states “Services shall be provided for the IHS Office of Executive Secretariat Staff (ExecSec) under the Office of the IHS Director”. Is this office located in Albuquerque? - Please review solicitation amendment 1 and 2 for answer to this question. The place of performance is located on the updated solicitation (5600 Fishers Lane, Rockville, MD 20857). The position is to be fully onsite with potential option to telework few days/pay period.

• Assuming that the performance location is Albuquerque, it appears that the incorrect wage determination has been provided. Albuquerque is located in Bernalillo County and SCA wage determination # 2015-5443 would be applicable. – As indicated on the updated amendment 3, the Wage Determination No. 2015-4269 Rev. 32 for the state of Maryland.

• Is this contract subject to the New Mexico Gross Receipts Tax (NMGRT)? The current tax rate is 7.6250% for Albuquerque. – As indicated on the updated amendment, the Wage Determination No. 2015-4269 Rev. 32 for the state of Maryland.

• Solicitation Paragraph 2. Contract Type indicates that this will be a Firm-Fixed Price Contract. However, the pricing schedule indicates a labor Hour type of contract with fully burdened labor rates and billing based on actual hours worked. Please advise. Yes, paid for hours worked – 40 hours per week – contractor tacks and reports.

• Solicitation Paragraph 2. Contract Type indicates a requirement for Medical Liability Insurance. Given the administrative nature of this contract requirement, is Medical Liability Insurance necessary? No, this is not necessary

• What SCA Labor Categories are applicable to the Senior Writer and Communications Specialist? – This is up to the vendor to determine.

• Is teleworking permitted or are contractor employees required to be in the HIS office? – As indicated on the updated amendment, the Wage Determination No. 2015-4269 Rev.

32 for the state of Maryland.

• Solicitation pages 15 through 18 contain fillable FAR Clauses. Are these clauses required to be submitted with offeror quotes? – Yes.

• Solicitation Section F – Instructions to Quoters and Evaluation states “quoters shall provide n Resume(s) or qualification summary for proposed personnel.” Is the government requesting named individuals be provided with the quotes or is a summary of required skills and qualification for each position acceptable? Given the short duration of 14 days between issuing the RFQ and the quote due date, it would be difficult to recruit qualified candidates in time, especially given the lack of clarity on the performance location. Additionally, if there are incumbent employees, most offerors would offer right of first refusal in order to maintain continuity of operations and institutional knowledge. Prefer resumes of proposed/named personnel, but will accept example resume of similar staff to be hired and information on staffing plan for filling the positions.

• Page 20 of the solicitation requires offerors to submit a Signed SF-18 (first page only is acceptable). The solicitation cover page is SF1449. Is that the form that is required with the submission or should offers download an SF18 and fill that out? – Offerors should review and sign SF1449 attached to the solicitation.

• Will the agency consider a pricing proposal where the price includes the wage set by wage determination documents PLUS the company’s wrap rate? - Yes

• Or will the set price, example, a Senior Technical writer would be a Technical Writer III with an hourly wage of $41.26. – See previous answer

• Is the set wage also the bill rate that the agency expects to pay or would the agency accept and pay the loaded rate that is inclusive of the wrap rate? – See previous answer

• Does the Government intend to award for one FTE Senior Writer, one FTE Communications Specialist or another staffing configuration? Please clarify the anticipated number of personnel to be proposed under each labor category. Yes, anticipate as described, with the proposal to include the contractor's recommendation.

• Is performance expected to be fully remote, hybrid, or onsite? If onsite presence is required, please provide the duty location and estimated onsite frequency. – Please review solicitation amendment 1 and 2 for answer to this question. The place of performance is located on the updated solicitation (5600 Fishers Lane, Rockville, MD 20857). The position is to be fully onsite with potential option to telework few days/pay period.

• Is any travel anticipated under this requirement? If so, please provide estimated frequency and locations. - Local travel and parking are not covered; parking is not provided to contractors

• Please clarify the relative importance of Technical Capability, Past Performance, and Price in the best-value determination. In order of importance: 1 Technical capability; 2 Past Performance; 3 Price

• The solicitation references Wage Determination No. 2015-5451 Rev. 28, while Attachment 2 appears to contain Wage Determination No. 2015-4269 Rev. 32. Please confirm the correct wage determination applicable to this requirement. – As indicated on the updated amendment 3, the Wage Determination No. 2015-4269 Rev. 32 for the state of Maryland.

• Can you identify what SCA labor classifications map to the requested categories? – This is up to the vendor to determine.

• Several sections of the solicitation reference medical liability insurance, professional medical judgment, patient safety considerations, clinical quality evaluations, and the recruitment and retention of qualified healthcare personnel. Please confirm whether these provisions were intentionally included in this Correspondence Management Support requirement or whether they were inadvertently carried over from a healthcare staffing solicitation. If inadvertent, will the Government issue an amendment clarifying the applicable requirements? – The wording has been removed from the solicitation.

• The labor categories are defined as Senior Writer and Communications Specialist and the scope of work is for executive administrative assistants providing correspondence support. The evaluation factors including the size and scope of past performance and the type of services provided on this opportunity say “nursing assistant”. Can the evaluation factors be updated to match the rest of the RFQ? – The solicitation document was updated under Amendment 1 to remove “nursing assistant” reference.

This was an oversight on our end as some of the information was carried over from another procurement document which was corrected under Amendment 1 which has the updated information . It is NOT executive admin assistant work – it is executive controlled correspondence requiring skilled writing and editing, analysis of documents for content and tone, coordination across the Agency, and an understanding of advanced government concepts, strategy, and sensitive issues.

• Can the Government please confirm if there are any file size limitations that will affect/restrict its ability to receive and open documents via email? – No limitation

• Will the Government please clarify if this a new or existing requirement? If existing, please provide the current/incumbent contract number. – New requirement as the prior contract ended

• If this is an existing requirement/contract, can the Government please provide the number of FTEs currently in each position? - Formerly had 2

• Will the Government please provide estimated volumes for Correspondence Management and Correspondence Writing/Editing/Quality Control for contractor to guage the level of effort needed. - Over 1,000 packages per year processed; each package includes 3 or more documents

• Can the Government please confirm that this opportunity is funded? – Yes

• If a viable and acceptable response is received, are there any obstacles limiting the

Government from issuing an award for this Solicitation? - No obstacle that the government is aware of.

• Can the Government please confirm how they would like the "Additional Required Documents" to be submitted? For example, would they prefer the SF-18, IEE Form, and any applicable amendments to be added to the end of Volume 3 - Price, or would the Government prefer they are submitted in a a separate volume, such as a "Volume 4 - Additional Required Documents"? – The solicitation document is update to include SF1449 (not SF18).

• Will the Government please provide an extension allowing bidders time to receive and review necessary Government Q&A responses related to pricing factors, level of effort, and to interview qualified personnel for resume submissions? – Government is not able to provide an extension at this time.

• It is stated to include travel in the pricing. Please provide travel details such as travel location(s), number of days per trip, vehicle or air transportation, FTEs required to travel, number of trips per year, etc. Or please clarify if the government would add CLIN to cover travel as a separate expense. - Local travel and parking are not covered;

parking is not provided to contractors

• Will the government allow remote work, and/or Remote Workers? - Yes, but prefer local and in-office a few days per week.

• 2. Contract Type: "In accordance with FAR 52.237-7, the Contractor shall indemnify and hold harmless the Government for liability arising from acts or omissions of the Contractor or its personnel during performance. The Contractor shall maintain medical liability insurance in amounts customary for the applicable specialty and acceptable to the Contracting Officer. These requirements shall apply to any subcontractor providing services under this contract." Can the Government please clarify Contractor's insurance requirements specifically relating to "medical liability insurance" for this requirement. - Wording was removed from solicitation. Please see updated document.

• Clause HHSAR 352.237-72 - Crime Control Act-Requirement for Background Checks (Dec 2015) refers to a background check for contractor's personnel. Can the Government please clarify any background investigations that are required to be conducted for contractor's personnel that will be performing for this opportunity?

Additionally, can the Government clarify if contractor's personnel can perform prior to the completion of the background checks and the typical duration of time that a candidate's background check takes for the Government to complete and contractor is notified? - Background check at public trust level is required BEFORE any work can begin. If all contractor paperwork is promptly submitted, and staff proposed has clean background, timeline is approximately 2-3 weeks.

• This section states, “The hourly rate shall be all-inclusive and include all direct and indirect costs, including but not limited to labor, fringe benefits, overhead, general and administrative expenses, travel, per diem, lodging, and all applicable Federal, State, Tribal, and local taxes.” Can you confirm if travel will be needed and, if so, how many trips and to what location(s)? - Local travel and parking are not covered; parking is not provided to contractors

• This section states: “This is a Firm-Fixed-Price contract based on a fixed, fully burdened hourly rate for a specified level of effort. The Government estimates 2,080 hours per year. Payment will be based on actual hours worked at the quoted hourly rate.” Would the government confirm the term Firm-Fixed-Price applies to the total amount of a base or OY\12 monthly payments? Applies to the total amount

• Deliverable 1 states: “Monthly report that describes/summarizes the activities performed each month. Report shall include descriptions of issues encountered and proposed solutions and be an aggregate of the daily and weekly reports identified in deliverables 2 and 3 below. Reports are subject to change based on IHS Leadership requirements.” Would the government clarify that Deliverable 1 is one (1) monthly report and the reports subject to change are the daily and weekly reports aggregated into the one (1) monthly report? Contractor shall provide a monthly report of work completed; the monthly report will be broken out by daily work completed each week.

• This bullet states: “The contractor shall maintain strict confidentiality and handle sensitive or classified correspondence with utmost discretion. Zero instances of breaches of HIPAA or Privacy Act violations.” Will the government require employees to sign non-disclosure agreements due to the potential handling of HIPAA? YES

• This clause is for key personnel and there are no key personnel listed. Would the government clarify as to which positions are key personnel or remove this clause?

Positions onboarded are considered Key Personnel. Contractor determines positions – the work requires senior writer skills and junior correspondence specialist skills sets.

• Bullet one (1) states: “The hourly rate shall be all-inclusive and include all direct and indirect costs, including but not limited to labor, fringe benefits, overhead, general and administrative expenses, travel, per diem, lodging, and all applicable Federal, State, Tribal, and local taxes.” Would the government provide any anticipated travel, per diem, and lodging (to include applicable Federal, State, Tribal, and local taxes)? - No

• The wage determination schedule given is for the State of New Mexico– As indicated on the updated amendment 3, the Wage Determination No. 2015-4269 Rev. 32 for the state of Maryland.

• Would the government please clarify all places of performance? Please review solicitation amendment 1 and 2 for answer to this question. The place of performance is located on the updated solicitation (5600 Fishers Lane, Rockville, MD 20857). The position is to be fully onsite with potential option to telework few days/pay period.

• Would the government provide the wage determination for all places of performance? – As indicated on the updated amendment 3, the Wage Determination No. 2015-4269 Rev. 32 for the state of Maryland.