Attachment 5 - Addendum to FAR 52.212-1- 123A94-24-Q-0018.docx

Addendum to 52.212-1 Instructions to Offerors-Commercial Items (Sep 2023)

A. To assure timely and equitable evaluation of offers, offerors must follow the instructions contained herein. Offerors are required to meet all solicitation requirements, including terms and conditions, representations, and certifications. Failure to meet a requirement may result in an offer being ineligible for award. Offerors must clearly identify any exception to the solicitation terms and conditions and provide complete accompanying rationale.

The response shall consist of three (3) separate parts; Part I – Technical Proposal, Part II – Price, and Part III – Past Performance.

B. The Contract Specialist and Contracting Officer are the Government’s sole point of contact for this acquisition. Address any questions or concerns you may have to the Contract Specialist and the Contracting Officer. Written requests for clarification may be sent to the Contracting Officer. The Government reserves the right to revise or amend the specifications, drawings, or the solicitation prior to the solicitation closing time.

Such revisions or amendments will be communicated by amendments to the Request for Proposal (RFP) and posted in the System for Award Management (https://sam.gov/content/opportunities). If such amendments require material changes in quantities or prices, the solicitation closing date may be postponed by enough days to enable offerors to revise their proposals. In such cases, the amendment will include an announcement of the new closing date and time. Offerors MUST acknowledge all amendments in their proposal by providing signed copies of the amendments with their proposal or by separate letter which includes a reference to the solicitation and amendment numbers. If an offeror believes that the requirements in these instructions contain an error, omission, or are otherwise unsound, the offeror shall immediately notify the Contracting Officer in writing with supporting rationale as well as the remedies the offeror is asking the Contracting Officer to consider as related to the omission or error. The offeror is reminded that the Government reserves the right to award this effort based on the initial proposal, as received, without discussion. This reservation includes matters of additional or substitute pages of the initial proposal.

C. The contracting officer has determined there is a high probability of adequate price competition in this acquisition. Upon examination of the initial offers, the contracting office will review this determination and if, in the contracting officer’s opinion, adequate price competition exists no additional cost information will be requested and certification under FAR 15.406-2 will not be required. However, if at any time during this competition the contracting officer determines that adequate price competition no longer exists; offerors may be required to submit information to the extent necessary for the contracting officer to determine the reasonableness and affordability of the price.

Attachment-5 Addendum to FAR 52.212-1 Instructions to Offerors

D. Documents submitted in response to this RFP must be fully responsive to and consistent with the following:

1. Requirements of the RFP (CLINs & SOW) and government standards and regulations pertaining to the SOW.

2. Evaluation Factors for Award in section, 52.212-2 EVALUATION – COMMERCIAL ITEMS of this RFP.

3. Any limitation on the number of offer pages. Pages exceeding the page limitations set forth in this section, FAR 52.212-1 INSTRUCTION TO OFFERORS – COMMERCIAL ITEMS, will not be read or evaluated and will be removed from the offer.

4. Offers must be submitted via email by the date and time specified on the combined synopsis/solicitation in accordance with FAR 52.212-1(f).

5. Digital documentation requirements shall be as follows:

a. The offer will be 8 ½” x 11” page size.

b. 20 pages, Double line spacing

c. Typing shall be Times New Roman Font, size 12.

6. The offer shall be submitted in a format readable and usable by Microsoft Office 2016 Word, Excel, PowerPoint, or PDF format viewable with standard Adobe Acrobat Reader X. Hidden fields, comments, macros, etc. shall be omitted, and read passwords on files shall not be used. The files shall be consistent and uniformly named to allow for easy distinction between Volume, Tab, etc. Inclusion of company name or abbreviation is acceptable. No picture shots of excel spreadsheets shall be included. Any and all excel spreadsheets and formulas shall be accessible for review if submitted. If multiple offers are submitted, the offer with the most recent time- stamp not later than required submission date and time will be considered the offeror’s official submission; this does not include contracting officer requests for final offers.

7. Offer Acceptance Period: Offerors must agree to hold the proposal prices in response to this solicitation as “firm” for 60 days after the date on the proposal.

8. Potential offerors are reminded they must: Be registered in the System for Award Management (SAM) at www.sam.gov with a current registration to be eligible for award; ensure that all representations and certifications are completed in SAM for the applicable Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR); and submit representations and certifications information with the offer to the contracting officer if applicable.

E. Specific Instructions:

1. PART I –TECHNICAL PROPOSAL –

Technical proposal shall address the following elements: Include all required information, excluding any reference to price. The technical proposal shall not be any more than 20 pages. The proposal shall concisely describe the Offeror’s response to the following:

Technical Evaluation Factors:

Factor 1 - TECHNICAL APPROACH. The proposal will be evaluated on how the offeror intends to organize, staff and manage the contract and the means that will be used to accomplish the contracts technical requirements. The degree to which the proposal demonstrates an understanding of the requirements will be evaluated, as well as the offeror's planned management of consultants and subcontractors, if applicable. Technical Acceptability will be determined by FSIS through evaluation of the following sub-factors (3):

a. Sub Factor 1- Overall Technical Approach

b. Sub Factor 2- Adherence to IT Systems & Data Requirements and Contractor Privacy Act Requirements

c. Sub Factor 3- Recordkeeping, Reporting, and Records Disposition

2. PART II – PRICE PROPOSAL – Submit 1 copy in .pdf or Microsoft Word or Excel 2016 compatible format.

a. Complete SF 1449 blocks 12, Discount Terms; 17a Contractor Name, Address, Cage Code, Telephone No., Fax No.; 30a, Signature of Offeror/Contractor; 30b., Name and Title of Signer; 30c. Date Signed, and applicable Reps and Certs. In doing so, the offeror accedes to the contract terms and conditions as written in the RFP.

b. Electronically fill out and insert proposed unit and extended prices in attachment-2 ‘CLIN proposal worksheet’ for each Contract Line-Item Number (CLIN). Offerors shall only use this attachment for proposed pricing. All other forms shall not be accepted.

3. PART III – PAST PERFORMANCE INFORMATION – Submit 1 copy in .pdf or Microsoft Word or Excel 2016 compatible format.

No more than three (3) Past Performance Questionnaires (PPQ) are requested to be submitted that are most similar to the work of this RFP that you have performed in the past five (5) years. The attached PPQ should be completed and submitted directly from your reference to the contracting office via email to reginald.brown@usda.gov. PPQs are requested to be submitted by the closing date of the RFP. PPQs provided directly by the offeror will not be considered.

Additionally, per FAR Part 15.305(2)(ii) offerors may provide information on problems encountered on the identified contracts and the offeror corrective actions.