Attachment 3 - Instructions to Offerors.pdf

Instructions to Offerors/Basis of Award

1. Instructions to Offerors:

A. This is a competitive small business set-aside conducted in accordance with (IAW) Federal Acquisition

Regulation (FAR) Part 19.202-4. The Contracting Officer (CO) will select the best submission which conforms to the solicitation requirements (to include all stated terms, conditions, representations, certifications, and all other information required by the submission instructions), and is judged, based on the evaluation factors, to represent the best value to the Government. The Government seeks to award to the Offeror who is best suited to fulfill the Air Force requirements. This may result in an award to a higher rated, higher priced Offeror, where the decision is consistent with the evaluation factors, and the CO reasonably determines that the technical and/or overall business approach of the higher priced

Offeror outweighs the price difference.

B. Offerors must clearly identify any exception to solicitation terms and conditions and must provide complete supporting rationale. The Government reserves the right to determine any such exceptions are unacceptable. Any exception determined unacceptable by the Government may result in the

Offeror’s proposal being determined unacceptable and ineligible for award. This information shall be provided in the format and content of the table below within the Offeror’s proposal cover letter. If no exceptions are taken, include a statement stating so within the proposal cover letter.

Solicitation Exceptions

Solicitation

Document

Page/

Paragraph

Requirement/

Portion Rationale

PWS, ITO,

Evaluation

Factor, etc.

Applicable

Page and

Paragraph

Numbers

Identify the requirement or portion to which exception is taken

Describe why the requirement can/will not be met

C. The proposal shall be clear, concise, and shall include sufficient detail for effective evaluation and for substantiating the validity of stated claims. The proposal should not simply rephrase or restate the

Government's requirements but, rather, shall provide convincing rationale to address how the Offeror intends to meet these requirements. Offerors shall assume that the Government has no prior knowledge of their facilities or experience and will base its evaluation on the information presented in the Offeror's proposal.

D. Discrepancies. If an Offeror believes that the requirements in these instructions contain an error, omission, or are otherwise unsound, the Offeror shall immediately notify the CO in writing with supporting rationale as well as the remedies the Offeror is asking the CO to consider as related to the omission or error.

E. Submit electronically via email in a format readable by Microsoft (MS) Word2010, Adobe Acrobat X Pro, MS Excel 2010, and MS-Power Point 2010.

Any questions whether technical or contractual in nature shall be submitted in writing to Contracting

Officer: Robert Willoughby, robert.willoughby.4@us.af.mil and Contracting Specialist: Jennifer Flores, jennifer.flores.21@us.af.mil by 05 OCT 2023 12:00pm CST. Questions shall not be answered individually.

The Offeror shall submit proposals for consideration no later than 09 OCT 2023 2:00pm CST. Only one (1) proposal shall be submitted, per company, in response to this requirement. Proposals received after the date/time specified may not be evaluated. Proposals shall be emailed to robert.willoughby.4@us.af.mil and jennifer.flores.21@us.af.mil.

F. Each Offeror submitting a proposal in response to this solicitation shall submit proposals in two volumes. Volume I –Technical Approach and Volume II – Price.

Format of proposal: Text shall be single-spaced, on an 8 ½ x 11 sheet with a minimum one-inch margin all around. Font shall be no less than Times New Roman 10 pt. Pages shall be numbered consecutively within each volume. The page limits prescribed are maximum page limits for each volume. When both sides of a sheet display printed material, it shall be counted as two (2) pages.

Cover pages, tables of contents, cross-reference matrix, tabs, and glossaries shall not be counted against prescribed page limits. Pages submitted in excess of these limits will not be read or considered in the

Government’s evaluation of the proposal. All proposal information shall be submitted in either MS Word or PDF format except for Pricing information (Volume II). Pricing information shall be submitted in MS

Excel format. Each volume shall be submitted as a separately- labeled electronic file.

All unit and extended prices provided shall be rounded to the nearest penny. Extended prices must be divisible by the number of units proposed. All loaded labor rates shall be rounded to the nearest penny.

Submit your proposal electronically in accordance with the table below. Submission shall include a completed copy of applicable Provisions and Clauses.

VOLUME REFERENCE TITLE

MAXIMUM NUMBER

OF PAGES

I

Factor 1 Technical Approach See below

Sub factor

1.1

Technical Understanding 10 Pages

II Factor 2 Price 10 Pages

2. Basis of Award: Evaluation

A. Award will be made in accordance with the basic contract ordering procedures and the procedures specified in the solicitation, to the Offeror whose proposal results in the best value to the Government.

An order may be awarded to the Offeror who is deemed responsible IAW FAR 9.1, as supplemented, whose proposal conforms to the solicitation’s requirements (to include all stated terms, conditions, mailto:robert.willoughby.4@us.af.mil mailto:jennifer.flores.21@us.af.mil mailto:robert.willoughby.4@us.af.mil mailto:jennifer.flores.21@us.af.mil representations, certifications, and all other information required by the solicitation instructions) and is judged, based on the evaluation factors and sub factors, to represent the best value to the Government.

B. Following receipt of responses to this solicitation, the Government will perform an analysis in order to select the Offeror that is best suited to fulfill the requirements of the solicitation. The comparative analysis will be based on the Offeror’s responses to the factors/sub-factors outlined in the solicitation, given their stated relative order of importance.

Once the Government determines the Offeror that is best-suited to meet stated requirements, the

Government reserves the right to communicate with only that Offeror to address any issues, if necessary, and finalize an order with that Offeror. If the parties cannot successfully resolve outstanding issues, as determined pertinent at the sole discretion of the Government, the Government may communicate with the next best-suited Offeror, based on the original analysis and address any necessary issues with that Offeror. If the government begins communication with the next best-suited

Offeror, no further communication with the previous Offeror will be entertained until after order award.

This process will continue until an agreement is successfully reached and an order is awarded.

C. Evaluation Factors.

The Technical Approach is more important than Cost/Price. Responses to this solicitation will be evaluated against the following factors and sub-factors:

FACTOR 1: Technical Approach

Sub factor 1.1 – Technical Understanding

The Technical Proposal shall be specific and complete. Legibility, clarity, and coherence are very important. Your responses will be evaluated against the Technical sub factors. Address your technical capability solution for meeting or exceeding the Government’s minimum performance or capability requirements in the Statement of Objectives (SOO) section V. All the requirements specified in the solicitation are mandatory. By your proposal submission, you are representing that your firm will perform all the requirements specified in the solicitation. Do not merely reiterate the objectives or reformulate the requirements specified in the solicitation.

The proposal is technically acceptable when the prime Offeror’s approach demonstrates the ability to effectively manage and accomplish purchase order requirements that meet or exceed the Statement of

Objectives (SOO) requirements.

The proposal is technically acceptable when the proposed organizational structure and staffing approach demonstrates an effective approach that will result in the successful accomplishment of the requirement and maintain a personnel support structure with the requisite education, skills, and expertise to perform tasks in accordance with the SOO. Technical acceptability is met when the proposal outlines how the offeror will organize their team and provide all necessary resources to efficiently perform the Audio Visual Equipment Rental for DORIES.

The ratings for these sub factors are as follows;

TECHNICAL CAPABILITY AND RATINGS

Rating Description

Exceptional Proposal exceeds requirements and demonstrates an exceptional understanding of the requirements and contains at least one strength.

Acceptable Proposal meets requirements and demonstrates an adequate approach and understanding of the requirements.

Unacceptable Proposal does not meet requirements of the solicitation, and thus, contains one or more deficiencies. Proposal is unawardable.

FACTOR 2: Cost/Price

The Offeror shall submit pricing information to support the completeness and reasonableness of their proposed prices for all CLINs. The pricing information submitted should fully support the SOO requirements for each major functional element specified in the SOO. Information shall show the consolidated total price for performance. Cost/price will be evaluated to determine if the Offeror’s cost/price is reasonable, complete, and balanced. Proposals should be sufficiently detailed to demonstrate their reasonableness. Offerors whose cost/price is determined to be incomplete or unreasonable will not be considered for award.

Price proposals should support the proposed technical approach. Cost/price will be evaluated to determine if the Offeror’s cost/price is reasonable and balanced. Proposals should be sufficiently detailed to demonstrate their reasonableness. Offerors whose cost/price is determined to be incomplete or unreasonable may not be considered for award. For a price to be reasonable, it must represent a price to the Government that a prudent person would pay in the conduct of competitive business. The Government will determine prices fair and reasonable through the use of one or more of the price analysis techniques at FAR 13.106-3.

Completeness. The proposal will be reviewed to determine the extent to which all the price elements have been addressed. The Offeror’s proposed price and other information will be evaluated to ensure continuity and traceability of prices to the technical volume and between the initial proposal and any revisions thereto. The review will determine the adequacy of the Offeror’s proposal in addressing and fulfilling the solicitation requirements.

Unbalanced Pricing. An Unbalanced Price evaluation will be performed IAW FAR 15.404-1(g). Offerors are cautioned against submitting an offer that contains unbalanced pricing. Unbalanced pricing may increase performance risk and could result in payment of unreasonably high prices. Unbalanced pricing exists when, despite an acceptable total evaluated price, the price of one (1) or more contract line items is significantly over or understated. The Government shall analyze offers to determine whether they are unbalanced with respect to separately priced line items or sub-line items. An offer that is determined to be unbalanced may be rejected if the Contracting Officer determines that the lack of balance poses an unacceptable risk to the Government.

Responsibility Determination. Information obtained from other sources available to the Government such as the Contractor Performance Assessment Rating System (CPARS) will be used as part of the responsibility determination made IAW FAR 9.104-1.

3. Point of contact (POC): The POCs for this acquisition are: robert.willoughby.4@us.af.mil and jennifer.flores.21@us.af.mil .

mailto:robert.willoughby.4@us.af.mil mailto:jennifer.flores.21@us.af.mil