Modification 3 SEAM II Final RFP Questions and Responses.pdf

To avoid confusion, the referenced note will be deleted since neither the full Government Property Management Plan nor a Management Volume is required for submission at the time of SEAM II proposal submission.

However, consistent with Section M guidance, the Property Management Plan information required per provision 1852.245-80 will be evaluated by the Government in assessing the responsibility of offerors before award contract award since the full Government Property Management Plan (DRL Line Item 6) is not due until requested under the contact after award.

12 B6, B7, and L31.2

- Price Factor (Volume II)

B-2 – B-19;

L-L-17 – L- L-23

The price proposal instructions of L31.2 and the OFI for proposed fully burdened rates for the Task Categories in Sections B6 and B7 allow only a single set of proposed rates for the SLCs, rather than both onsite and offsite rates.

Question: Do Offerors propose rates assuming all authorized SEAM II work will be performed offsite?

The Government does not intend to require Offerors to proposes two separate sets of rates tables for on-site and off-site work.

For reference, a large majority of the work performed on the SEAM I contract has been performed off-site.

13 Attachment J.2 - DRL and DRD, DRD J.2.5 &

DRD J.2.7

N/A Comment:

DRD J.2.5, Organizational Conflict of Interest (OCI) Plan [DRL Item No. 5] is included twice in Attachment J.2 and DRD J.2.7 Reports Required for Logistics [DRL Item No. 7] has been excluded from the attachment.

This duplication of data requirements description (DRD) 5 and omission of DRD 7 will be corrected by amendment to the RFP.

14 Attachment J.2 - DRL and DRD, Further Explanation of DRL, Block 9, N/A Comment:

Table 1 - DRL Reference and the DRD for DRD J.2.3 state the title as "Task Order Status Report", whereas the DRL Line Item No. 3 states the title as "Project Status Report".

The discrepancy between the titles of Table 1 - DRL Reference and the DRD for DRD J.2.3 and DRD 3 and DRL Line Item No. 3 will be corrected by amendment to the solicitation to ensure all

Table 1 - DRL Reference references reflect the title “Task Order Status Report.”

15 Section M1 M-1 – M-2 The Government provides that in the Performance Price Tradeoff (PPT) Evaluation, "Past Performance is significantly more important Price."

Question: Is it reasonable for Offerors to assume that the greater importance placed on Past Performance will prevent lower calculated prices of Offerors with less relevant past performance being selected over Offerors with a higher price and more relevant past performance? In other words, will the PPT occur among only among the Offerors within the same Past Performance Confidence Rating?

Section M prescribes the relative weighting of evaluation factors where Past Performance is significantly more important than Price. However, Section M does not prescribe additional limitations that would further restrict the tradeoff between evaluation factors such that the tradeoff would include only those offers receiving the same past performance confidence rating as a result of proposal evaluation by the streamlined procurement team (SLPT).

16 If we have a contract that was originally awarded in 2011 that includes task orders with a period of performance that goes through Dec. 2017, can you please confirm that meets the “recency” criteria?

As stated in Section M regarding recency, only contract period of performance within the five years from the date of this SEAM II solicitation will be considered in the past performance evaluation.

Therefore, the Government will evaluate past performance that can be demonstrated to have occurred during that five-year period of performance.

17 If we supported a specific program for the same commercial customer under an umbrella of multiple contracts or purchase orders, can we use this group of purchase orders as a single past performance example to demonstrate performance and critical capabilities or will each individual purchase order for our services be considered a separate contract that counts towards the 10 max contracts?

As stated in the solicitation, each offeror may propose up to 10 contracts that demonstrate its past performance relative to the SEAM II competition in each task category.

The Government does not intend to amend the solicitation to relax this number of contracts that may be proposed for evaluation under the Past Performance Volume.

18 L31.1 L-L-15 Past Performance Narrative states that Offerors shall clearly detail “…what portions of the Statement of Work the prime and subcontractors are responsible for…” Can the Government clarify how Offerors shall present this information when Offerors are discussing past performance contracts mapped against the Attachment L.32.1 (Relevant Past Performance Matrix) criteria and not the Statement of Work?

It is the offerors’ responsibility to detail in their Past Performance narrative what portions of the Statement of Work the prime and subcontractors are responsible. The Government intentionally does not provide specific guidance regarding how the Contractor meets this requirement. Rather, Section L provides Offerors discretion regarding how it may effectively communicate its specific past performance and its relation to the SOW.

Further, Offerors are reminded that each critical capability described in the past performance matrix corresponds to specific sections of the statement of work.

Further, Offerors are also reminded that L.32.1 states, “The narrative may also include other relevant experience and approaches addressing other areas of the statement of work that are not listed as critical capabilities in Attachment L.32.1 (Relevant Past Performance Matrix), such as project management, provisioning, quality assurance, testing capabilities, etc.”

19 L31.1 L-L-15 Past Performance Narrative states that Offerors shall clearly detail “…the specific resources (workforce, management, facilities, or other resources) to be employed and relied upon to perform the proposed effort.” As these tasks are generally management-related items of the prime Offerors overall corporate resources and not specific to individual contract capabilities, industry recommends that the Government remove this requirement from the Past Performance Narrative section.

The Government noted that the phrase “…the specific resources (workforce, management, facilities, or other resources) to be employed and relied upon to perform the proposed effort” is utilized three separate times in the draft RFP.

Further, the Government considered that this exact phrase is also utilized in the JSC Procurement Instruction Provision entitled 52.215-115 “Past Performance Evaluation. (NOV 2018) (JSC Procurement Instruction).”

The purpose of this phrase is to delineate the work the prime contractor may perform vs. the work its proposed subcontractors may perform in order to validate that the prime contractor will have meaningful involvement in contract performance.

20 L31.1 L-L-15 Past Performance Narrative states that Offerors shall “…provide relevant past performance that demonstrates performance and/or access to facilities necessary to perform SEAM II SOW requirements without requiring the use of NASA facilities.” Given that a contract with similar expertise across the task areas and similar facility requirement does not necessarily equate to proximity to the necessary facilities needed to perform the SEAM II SOW requirements, industry recommends that the Government remove this requirement from the Past Performance Narrative section.

The Government considers past performance that demonstrates performance and/or access to facilities necessary to perform SEAM II requirements without requiring the use of NASA facilities to be relevant. Therefore, the Government will continue to include the following sentence in L31.1:

“The Offeror shall provide relevant past performance that demonstrates performance at facilities necessary to perform SEAM II SOW requirements without requiring the use of NASA facilities.”

The solicitation language is there to afford each offeror an opportunity to demonstrate its recent success in performing relevant work that required the offeror to perform work using the types of specialized facilities that may be required in the future to successfully accomplish SEAM II SOW requirements. The solicitation language does not prevent an offeror from proposing past performance that demonstrates its success in performing recent work relevant to SEAM II where the facilities it accessed in accomplishing that work may not have been in close proximity to the offeror.

21 L31.1 L-L-15 Can the Government confirm that the Past Performance Consent Letter [L.32.5] shall only be included for those subcontractor teammates whose past performance will be utilized as part

The Government confirms that there is not a requirement to provide a consent letter for firms whose past performance is not proposed in the Past Performance Volume.

of the Prime Offerors proposal response and is not required for all subcontractor teammates.

22 L31.1 L-L-15 Past Performance Narrative states that Offerors shall detail “…how they have managed fluctuations in workload and resources including use of contractor owned or contractor accessible facilities and equipment.” As these tasks are generally management-related items of the prime Offerors overall corporate resources and not specific to individual contract capabilities, industry recommends that the Government remove this requirement from the Past Performance Narrative section.

The purpose of the language cited in the question is to provide the Offeror with guidance that highlights the Government’s position that past performance that demonstrates fluctuations in workload and resources including use of contractor owned or contractor accessible facilities and equipment is relevant to SEAM II.

Therefore, the Government will not remove the language in Section L31.1 “Past Performance Narrative” states that Offerors “…how they have managed fluctuations in workload and resources including use of contractor owned or contractor accessible facilities and equipment.”

23 L.31.1 L-L-17 The Government states that Offerors are to provide “A letter from the insurance carrier providing workers compensation coverage (or equivalent) summarizing the Offeror’s Experience Modification Rates, loss run data, liability and lawsuit history related to safety and health performance for the past three years including history of changes to the experience modified rate. If an Offeror self-insures, provide and certify the same information (except the experience modification rate history) with the signature of the responsible corporate officer or official.”

Would submission of annual reports from the National Council on Compensation Insurance (NCCI) for the experience modification rating and the most recent Loss Runs from the insurer meet these requirements?

The Government will accept documentation specific to the company that provides Experience Modification Rates, loss run data, liability and lawsuit history related to safety and health performance for the past three years including history of changes to the experience modified rate.

However, Offerors are cautioned that general industry information that does not include this data will not meet this requirement.

24 L.31.1, L.32.3 L-L-16 The Government states that the Offerors shall “submit the Past Performance Questionnaire, Attachment L.32.3, to up to six (per Task Category) of the point of contact references listed in Attachment L.32.2 (References Table).

The Offeror is responsible for ensuring that references are directed to return one electronic copy of each questionnaire directly to the Contracting Specialist via e-mail as identified in provision L.8 Proposal Marking Instructions.”

If CPARs exist for a contract, is the Offeror still required to submit a PPQ

Yes, as stated in the solicitation, the Government will consider information gathered from multiple sources as part of its evaluation of Past Performance.

25 L.31.1 L-L-16 DRFP section L.31.1 indicates that a past performance questionnaire (attachment L.32.3) will be required. If an offeror submits a proposal against more than one SEAM II task orders and uses the same past performance program for each (acknowledging that a separate past performance write-up tailored to the task order will be required), will separate questionnaires be required from the government contracting office for each task order or will one questionnaire suffice for all task order proposals.

No, a single questionnaire may demonstrate past performance in more than one task category.

26 Spreadsheet L.L.32.2

N/A Spreadsheet L.L.32.2 line 11 – Header is titles “Percentage of Contract Value performed if acting as a subcontractor”. However, the field contains a drop-down menu with selections of either prime or sub – other than reformatting the field, there is no way of inputting the requested information.

The Government will revise Spreadsheet L-L.32.2 to remove drop-down option and allow percentages to be input.

These revisions will be provided via an amendment to the solicitation.

27 SEAM cover letter section (2)

L-L27 SEAM cover letter section (2) and RFP section L31.3.C states:

The Offeror must submit a completed DRD 5 “ Organizational Conflicts of Interest (OCI) Plan” with its proposal to meet the responsibility and RFP section L31.3.C

C. Organizational Conflict of Interest (OCI) Information

In accordance with FAR Subpart 9.5, Organizational and Consultant Conflicts of Interest, the Offeror and proposal will be reviewed for existing and potential OCI issues in relation to this procurement. These conflicts may be present for existing JSC Contractors who could have insight to NASA Task Order requirements. The Contractor shall submit the information required by the OCI Plan DRD 5.

Also, DRD J.2.5 (page J-30) and Attachment J.9 says that the OCI avoidance plan will be incorporated after contract award

Does the offeror submit a SEAM II OCI plan as part of the proposal or simply state our possible OCI as part of the proposal.

requirement detailed at L31.3. “RESPONSIBILITY CONSIDERATIONS – VOLUME III,” subsection C “Organizational Conflict of Interest (OCI) Information.”

Please note that in accordance with Table “L-3:

Overview of Proposal Volumes, Page Limitations, Copies, and Format” that items associated with

“RESPONSIBILITY CONSIDERATIONS –

VOLUME III” are excluded from page limits.

28 M1.1. PAST

PERFORMANCE

FACTOR -

VOLUME I

M-2 There are no section M evaluation bullets for the 1-page past performance introductory, will this be evaluated?

Information about performance on recent and relevant contracts proposed in the Past Performance Volume that are proposed in accordance with solicitation instructions will be evaluated under the Past performance Factor in accordance with Section M of the solicitation.

29 L31.4. MODEL

CONTRACT -

VOLUME IV

L-L-28 Section L31.4.A states, “Offerors shall also submit with its proposal, in Volume IV, the Model Contract (all pages in Sections A-1 through K-14) in its entirety (basic and any amendments)…”

The Government will provide an updated version of the Final RFP in which the cover page is provided as a separate document, which will allow Offerors to export from PDF to Microsoft Word.

In order to simplify the RFP requirement for inclusion of the entire document in Volume IV, it would be helpful if the Government would release the Model Contract and any subsequent Amendments as MS Word documents. Would the Government consider providing the Model Contract and Amendments as MS Word documents?