BENEFEDS_Sources_Sought_RFI_Notice.pdf
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- Solicitation number
- 24361827S0001
- Issued by
-
Office of Personnel Management
About this file
This is a Sources Sought Notice and Request for Information (RFI) issued by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) for the follow-on acquisition of BENEFEDS, a federal benefits enrollment and premium administration platform supporting three programs: the Federal Employees Dental and Vision Insurance Program (FEDVIP), the Federal Flexible Spending Account Program (FSAFEDS), and the Federal Long Term Care Insurance Program (FLTCIP).
The anticipated requirement involves a single-award Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity contract with a nine-month Start-Up (transition-in) period beginning at award, followed by fixed-price service fees based on per-enrollment, per-account, or per-payor pay-period metrics. Key deliverables include web and telephonic enrollment functionality, premium and allotment administration for 60+ payroll providers, multi-channel customer service with bilingual capabilities (English and Spanish), IT security and FISMA authorization, WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility conformance, and fraud detection. Baseline volumes include approximately 6.4 million FEDVIP enrollments (8.13 million covered lives), 523,000 FSAFEDS accounts, and 233,534 FLTCIP payors. The contact center handles 560,859 calls during the five-week Open Season and 1.63 million annually otherwise. OPM seeks performance standards including 85% call answer speed within 30 seconds outside Open Season, 99.9% monthly system availability, 99.5% bill-file timeliness, and 99% payment-posting accuracy within two business days. The anticipated NAICS code is 524292 (Third Party Administration of Insurance and Pension Funds); the anticipated PSC is R799. All work must be performed on premises or in FedRAMP-authorized cloud environments within the United States with no offshore performance or data storage. Questions are due by October 14, 2026, 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time; responses are due by October 26, 2026, 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time. The anticipated solicitation release is approximately December 2026, with award expected in spring 2027 and full services commencing on or about December 31, 2027. OPM has not determined a set-aside but anticipates a small business participation requirement of at least 30% of total contract value if competed on an unrestricted basis. This is market research issued under FAR Parts 10 and 15.201(e) and is not a solicitation.
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BENEFEDS Follow-On — Sources Sought Notice / RFI — FINAL — posted 10/07/2026
UNITED STATES OFFICE OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT
Office of Procurement Operations | Healthcare and Insurance
SOURCES SOUGHT NOTICE AND REQUEST FOR INFORMATION
BENEFEDS — Federal Benefits Enrollment and Premium Administration Services (Follow-On
Acquisition)
Supporting the Federal Employees Dental and Vision Insurance Program (FEDVIP), the Federal Flexible Spending Account Program (FSAFEDS), and the Federal Long Term Care Insurance Program (FLTCIP)
Notice information
Notice type Sources Sought (market research) with Request for Information questions — issued under FAR Part 10 and FAR 15.201(e). THIS IS NOT A SOLICITATION.
Notice ID Assigned by SAM.gov at posting
Issuing office U.S. Office of Personnel Management, Office of Procurement Operations, Procurement Services Division, 1900 E Street NW, Washington, DC 20415
Anticipated NAICS 524292 — Third Party Administration of Insurance and Pension Funds (size standard per the current SBA Table of Size Standards, 13 CFR 121.201). The 2022 contract was coded 541611;
respondents are asked to comment on the appropriate code (Question 9.1). Anticipated PSC:
R799.
Place of performance Contractor facilities within the 50 United States and the District of Columbia; no offshore performance or data storage
Posting date Wednesday, October 7, 2026
Questions about this notice due Wednesday, October 14, 2026, 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time, by email
Responses due Monday, October 26, 2026, 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time, by email
Point of contact James D. Faulkner, Contract Specialist — James.Faulkner@opm.gov; Dennis N. Hodges, Healthcare and Insurance — Dennis.Hodges@opm.gov (email only; no telephone inquiries)
Attachments 1 — Respondent Information and Questionnaire (Excel workbook; required response format); 2
— Requirements Traceability Matrix, 2022 baseline (reference only); 3 — Roles and Responsibilities Matrix, 2022 baseline (reference only)
This is not a solicitation. FAR Part 10 market research; FAR 15.201(e). | Page 1 of 12
1. Purpose of This Notice The U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) is conducting market research for the follow-on acquisition of BENEFEDS, the Government-sponsored enrollment, premium and allotment administration, and customer service platform for FEDVIP, FSAFEDS, and FLTCIP. This notice has two purposes:
1. Sources sought. To identify firms of all sizes, including small businesses in every socioeconomic category, that can perform the anticipated requirement as a prime contractor or as a teaming partner, so that OPM can make its small business determination under FAR Part 19 and shape its small business participation requirements.
2. Request for information. To obtain industry's comments on the anticipated requirement, the proposed performance standards, the transition approach, the contract structure, and — most importantly — anything OPM has not listed that a capable administrator would expect to see specified, before the requirement is finalized. OPM intends to write a Performance Work Statement that describes outcomes and lets any qualified firm propose its own solution; industry's feedback on where the draft still presumes a particular system, process, or provider is specifically requested.
This notice is issued solely for information and planning purposes and does not constitute a solicitation, a request for proposal, or a commitment by the Government to issue a solicitation or award a contract.
Responses are not offers and cannot be accepted by the Government to form a binding contract. The Government will not reimburse any cost incurred in responding. Respondents are responsible for monitoring SAM.gov for any future solicitation. Not responding to this notice does not preclude participation in any future solicitation. Information marked as proprietary will be protected to the extent permitted by law; responses may be reviewed by Government support contractors who are bound by non-disclosure agreements.
2. Background OPM establishes benefits policy government-wide and contracts with insurance carriers and program administrators, but it does not maintain a government-wide eligibility file, perform enrollments, or hold enrollment records for its voluntary benefit programs. Federal employees are paid by more than sixty payroll providers and belong to more than 150 Government agencies. BENEFEDS was established in 2006 so that FEDVIP carriers are not required to build enrollment and premium interfaces with every agency and payroll office. It has since become the single enrollment and premium administration platform for FEDVIP, the payroll allotment administration platform for FSAFEDS, and the premium administration platform for FLTCIP. Its four major components are a public website and authenticated customer portal (BENEFEDS.gov / BENEFEDS.com and MyBENEFEDS), data exchange with carriers, administrators, and payroll providers, a premium administration system, and a bilingual contact center. The enrollment and eligibility portal includes customer decision-support tools, including a plan option comparison tool and a dental procedure cost comparison tool.
The current contract, IDIQ 24322622D0006, was competitively awarded on June 28, 2022 and is administered by OPM Healthcare and Insurance; services for calendar year 2027 are being provided under a task order on that contract. OPM anticipates awarding the follow-on contract in the spring of 2027, with a Start-Up (transition-in) period of approximately nine months and full services beginning on or about December 31, 2027, so that plan year 2028 coverage effective January 1, 2028 is administered under the new contract. The BENEFEDS name, logos, website addresses, toll-free numbers, public content, and all
This is not a solicitation. FAR Part 10 market research; FAR 15.201(e). | Page 2 of 12 enrollment, premium, allotment, and customer service data are Government property that the follow-on contractor will operate and, at the end of the contract, transition to a successor.
3. Anticipated Requirement The following describes the requirement as currently drafted. It is provided so that respondents can assess capability and comment; it will be refined before any solicitation and should not be read as final. Terms follow the definitions in the draft PWS: "Enrollee," "Payor," and "Participant" refer to FEDVIP, FLTCIP, and FSAFEDS customers respectively; "Payroll Provider" includes civilian payroll offices, uniformed services pay systems, and annuity systems; "Performance Start Date" is the first day of full services.
3.1 Objectives
• Every eligible person who elects coverage is enrolled accurately, the correct premium or allotment is collected from the correct source on time, premium payments reach the carriers and administrators on time, and no covered individual experiences a gap in coverage caused by the Contractor.
• Enrollment and money are reconciled completely at the individual level with each FEDVIP carrier, the FSAFEDS Administrator, and the FLTCIP Administrator, and program funds are safeguarded from receipt through disbursement.
• Customers have accessible, plain-language, self-service digital channels and prompt, accurate human customer service in English and Spanish, with a live person always available as an option and translation services available for other languages as needed.
• The system is secure, privacy-protective, compliant with FISMA and Federal privacy law, highly available, authorized to operate under OPM's security program, and scales for Open Season peaks.
• Agencies, carriers, payroll providers, and OPM receive the education, support, and data they need;
the Contractor transitions in without disruption and transitions out in a way that lets a successor do the same.
• Fraud, waste, and abuse detection is supported within and across the three programs by identifying suspect activities and trends.
• The platform can support other new or existing OPM-administered benefit programs that may use its enrollment and eligibility, payroll premium allocation, eligibility confirmation, or medical review functions when OPM so directs; such additions would be priced as described in Section 3.4.
3.2 Scope of Services
Table 3-1. Anticipated scope
Functional area What the Contractor delivers (summary) Indicative measures (draft)
Enrollment and eligibility (FEDVIP)
Web, mobile-responsive, and telephonic enrollment; eligibility screening and self-certification with anomaly edits; Open Season, new-hire, and qualifying-life-event processing with correct effective dates; post-enrollment validation against payroll pre-validation files, EHRI, and the OPM annuity look-up; enrollment maintenance (status changes, dependents aging out, retirements, survivors); dual-enrollment detection; daily enrollment files and full-file reconciliations with carriers; plan comparison and decision support.
Transaction accuracy; carrier file timeliness and accuracy;
validation cycle time; anomaly audits; FEHB data to carriers within days after Open Season.
This is not a solicitation. FAR Part 10 market research; FAR 15.201(e). | Page 3 of 12
Functional area What the Contractor delivers (summary) Indicative measures (draft)
Premium and allotment administration
Common billing engine for all three programs: pre-validation and bill files to more than sixty payroll and annuity providers on their calendars; payment posting; adjustments and refunds (pre-tax through payroll, post-tax direct); missed-deduction research and resolution; direct billing and automatic bank withdrawal for annuitants, uniformed-service retirees, and others not on payroll;
program-specific rules (FEDVIP rating regions and OPM administrative fee; FSAFEDS allotments from annual elections with payments routed to the FSAFEDS Administrator; FLTCIP payor premiums from Administrator-furnished tables); funds custody, daily cash reconciliation, remittance to carriers, administrators, and OPM; furlough and lapse-in-appropriations procedures.
Bill files by payroll cutoff; posting within two business days; refund timeliness; no-payment resolution within two pay cycles; billing accuracy; exact-match remittance;
reconciliation aging; SOC 1 Type 2.
Customer service Multi-channel, multi-tier contact center (telephone with IVR, email/secure message, mail, TTY/relay) scalable for Federal Benefits Open Season, serving customers, agencies, carriers, payroll providers, and OPM; staffing and training of customer service representatives fluent in English and Spanish, with translation support for other languages including French, Italian, German, Farsi, Arabic, Japanese, Urdu, Greek, Russian, Chinese (Mandarin and Cantonese), and Korean; timely response to general and misdirected inquiries, emails, and correspondence, and to calls generated by BENEFEDS, carrier, or OPM communications; extended Open Season hours; case management with exportable history; 100 percent call recording;
quality monitoring; customer satisfaction measurement; written correspondence and notices from OPM-approved templates; use of OPM's Annuity Look-up Tool to verify eligibility, subject to OPM approval and access requirements.
Speed of answer and abandonment (separate Open Season values); email and correspondence response times;
case resolution; quality and accuracy scores; satisfaction.
Education, communications, and Open Season
Annual communication plan and Open Season campaign; plain-language, Section 508-conformant content approved by OPM;
Open Season readiness (load testing, staffing, carrier coordination, daily reporting, post-Open-Season enrollment report); outreach to new hires and agency benefits officers;
carrier and program manuals.
Readiness review passed; content approvals; daily Open Season reports; post-Open-Season report within three business days.
Information technology, security, privacy, accessibility, continuity
The Contractor's solution, of any architecture, hosted in the United States on premises or in a FedRAMP-authorized cloud;
FISMA security authorization (ATO) under OPM's program before production; NIST SP 800-53 controls at the OPM-designated impact level; identity proofing and authentication through the Government-furnished login.gov integration already in use, at the assurance levels OPM directs; privacy impact assessment and Privacy Act compliance; WCAG 2.1 AA conformance with an Accessibility Conformance Report; continuity of operations with stated recovery objectives; configuration and release management with an Open Season change freeze; disaster recovery and continuity-of-operations capability sized for Open Season peaks; any use of artificial intelligence or automation in customer-facing or decision-support functions only with OPM approval and consistent with Federal AI policy; data ownership, retention, and return in open formats.
Availability (monthly, with a higher Open Season value); page performance; capacity/load test;
vulnerability remediation timelines; incident reporting; ACR currency; COOP test results.
Reporting, data access, and fraud, waste, and abuse
Monthly performance report with every QASP measure; financial, reconciliation, and Open Season reports; ad hoc reports;
Government read-only data access and extracts in open formats;
Report timeliness and acceptance;
ad hoc turnaround; FWA referral timeliness.
This is not a solicitation. FAR Part 10 market research; FAR 15.201(e). | Page 4 of 12
Functional area What the Contractor delivers (summary) Indicative measures (draft) fraud, waste, and abuse program with hotline, training, referrals, and annual report, including monitoring, identification, and analysis of suspect activities and trends within and across programs.
Program management and transition
Program management plan, key personnel, quality control plan, configuration control board with OPM participation; Start-Up Period (transition-in) with plan, interface certification, at least two mock conversions, ATO, operational readiness review, cutover and hypercare; transition-out data and knowledge transfer to a successor.
Deliverable timeliness and acceptance; Start-Up milestones;
corrective action plan timeliness.
Out of scope. FSAFEDS enrollment, claims, and customer service (performed by the FSAFEDS Administrator); FLTCIP applications, underwriting, claims, and customer service (performed by the FLTCIP Administrator); FEDVIP carrier plan administration and claims; FEHB and FEGLI administration; eligibility determinations that belong to employing offices and carriers.
3.3 Program Environment and Baseline Volumes
The figures below are drawn from the program's monthly activity reports for calendar year 2025 (counts as of early January 2026) except where a 2021 figure is noted; OPM intends to furnish complete current data, including Open Season daily statistics and payroll-provider detail, with any solicitation. Respondents should treat them as indicative.
Table 3-2. Baseline volumes (indicative; calendar year 2025 unless noted)
Dimension Baseline (2021)
FEDVIP enrollments / covered lives 6.40 million enrollments (3.79 million dental, 2.61 million vision), 4.04 million unique enrollees, and 8.13 million covered lives as of January 6, 2026, reflecting Open Season 2025 elections. Plan year 2025 had 12 dental and 5 vision carriers; plan year 2026 has 11 dental and 5 vision; new carrier contracts are expected for plan years beginning January 1, 2028.
FSAFEDS accounts Approximately 523,000 accounts for 470,000 participants (2021 figure; current figure will accompany the solicitation). Allotment administration only.
FLTCIP payors 233,534 payors as of January 2, 2026 (pension 88,381; automatic bank withdrawal 66,850; direct bill 49,042; payroll 29,261). Declining; FLTCIP has been closed to new applications since December 2022.
Payroll and annuity providers Six major providers carry approximately 95 percent of deductions; more than fifty additional providers carry the remainder; more than 150 employing agencies. FEDVIP premium method as of January 2026: payroll 50.6 percent, annuity 42.0 percent, automatic bank withdrawal 7.2 percent, direct bill 0.2 percent. Premiums administered in 2025: approximately $3.9 billion.
Contact center — Open Season (five weeks)
Calendar year 2025: 560,859 calls to the toll-free number in November and December, of which 343,897 reached agents after IVR containment; December average speed of answer 191 seconds and abandonment 4.6 percent; approximately 5,000 emails received in November and December. (2021 last-day peak: approximately 53,000 calls.)
Contact center — rest of year Calendar year 2025: 1,630,906 calls to the toll-free number, 937,304 reaching agents (IVR containment 42.5 percent); outside Open Season 51,000–84,000 agent calls per month with average speed of answer under 5 seconds; 12,091 emails received plus 17,706 automated quick replies; approximately 11,000 Spanish-language calls (2021 figure);
This is not a solicitation. FAR Part 10 market research; FAR 15.201(e). | Page 5 of 12
Dimension Baseline (2021) callback option available.
Web traffic Calendar year 2025: 8.75 million sessions and 88 million page views; November 2.16 million sessions and 28.4 million page views; outside Open Season 340,000–650,000 sessions per month; mobile share 32–38 percent. About 85 percent of enrollments are completed online; the remainder through customer service.
Open Season enrollment transactions
Outside Open Season, 486,305 new enrollments in calendar year 2025 (266,122 dental, 220,183 vision). Open Season 2025 daily counts will accompany the solicitation (2021:
approximately 7,500 per day on average and 43,000 on the last day).
Records to convert at Start-Up All active enrollment, payor, and participant records plus premium and allotment history back to 2004–2006 (approximately 8.1 million covered lives across 6.4 million enrollments; history record counts will accompany the solicitation)
3.4 Anticipated Contract Structure and Schedule
• Single-award Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity contract with a Start-Up (transition-in) period beginning at award and running to the Performance Start Date (approximately nine months), followed by fixed-price service fees stated per enrollment, account, or payor per pay period, ordered by period. OPM is considering whether Start-Up should be a separately priced firm-fixed-price task order payable on completion of transition-in and security authorization, or recovered through the service fees (see Question 5.5.1). The number and length of option periods are under review.
• FEDVIP service fees are retained from premiums; FSAFEDS and FLTCIP fees are invoiced to and paid from the respective program funds; no separate Start-Up payment is made under the current contract.
• Anticipated evaluation approach: a two-phase process in which a short Phase One submission (financial viability, minimum experience, ownership and place of performance) is used for an advisory or firm down-select before full Phase Two proposals; award without discussions is anticipated. Industry comment on this approach is requested in Section 5.
• Anticipated schedule (subject to change): solicitation release approximately December 2026;
proposals early 2027; award spring 2027; Start-Up through December 2027; full services on or about December 31, 2027.
• Small business: OPM has not determined a set-aside. If the requirement is competed on an unrestricted basis, OPM anticipates a small business participation requirement (the 2022 solicitation required at least 30 percent of total contract value) and a subcontracting plan from other-than-small offerors.
3.5 Draft Performance Standards
Attachment 1, tab "4-Draft Standards," lists the performance standards OPM is considering, each with a proposed acceptable quality level (for example: 85 percent of calls answered within 30 seconds outside Open Season and 80 percent within 90 seconds during Open Season; abandonment no greater than 5 percent; 99 percent of emails answered within three business days; 99.9 percent monthly availability with
99.95 percent during Open Season; bill files by payroll cutoff 99.5 percent; payments posted within two business days 99 percent; billing accuracy 99.9 percent; exact-match remittance 100 percent; deliverables on time 95 percent). Respondents are asked whether each is achievable, what standard they meet on
This is not a solicitation. FAR Part 10 market research; FAR 15.201(e). | Page 6 of 12 comparable programs, how they define and measure it, and — critically — which standards OPM has not listed that they would expect a well-run program to hold its administrator to.
This is not a solicitation. FAR Part 10 market research; FAR 15.201(e). | Page 7 of 12
4. Information Requested — Business and Capability Information All respondents should complete Attachment 1 tabs 1 and 2 and provide a capability statement of no more than 15 pages. A firm interested only in teaming or subcontracting may complete tab 1 and provide a capability statement of no more than 5 pages.
4.1 Respondent information (Attachment 1, tab 1)
• Company name, address, UEI, CAGE code, website, and point of contact.
• Business size under NAICS 524292 and under NAICS 541611, and all socioeconomic categories that apply (small business, 8(a), HUBZone, SDVOSB/VOSB, WOSB/EDWOSB), with SBA certification status where applicable.
• Whether the firm would pursue the requirement as a prime contractor, as a joint venture or mentor-protégé participant, or as a subcontractor, and the functions it would perform in each role.
• Ownership: whether the firm is owned or controlled by an insurance carrier, benefits administrator, or other entity that participates in FEDVIP, FSAFEDS, or FLTCIP, or by a foreign entity.
• Contract vehicles held (for example, GSA Multiple Award Schedule categories) and relevant certifications (SOC 1/SOC 2, FedRAMP authorizations, ISO 27001, PCI DSS, URAC or similar).
4.2 Capability statement (narrative, 15 pages maximum)
3. Comparable experience. For up to three programs performed in the last seven years, state the client, population served (lives, accounts, or policies), annual transaction and payment volumes, number of employer, payroll, or carrier interfaces, contact center volumes and hours, whether the firm was prime or subcontractor, and the period of performance. Public-sector, plan-sponsor, and commercial third-party administration experience are all relevant; Federal experience is not required.
4. Solution overview. Describe the platform(s) you would propose (commercial, configured, or custom; hosting model; FedRAMP status), how enrollment, billing, payment, reconciliation, and case management are integrated, and how the solution would scale to Open Season peaks.
5. Security authorization experience. Describe systems for which you have achieved and maintained a FISMA authorization at the Moderate impact level or a FedRAMP Moderate authorization, including elapsed time from contract start to ATO.
6. Transition and data conversion experience. Describe comparable transitions from an incumbent, including record volumes converted, mock-conversion approach, interface certification with third parties, and elapsed time.
7. Contact center and financial operations. Describe your bilingual contact center capabilities, quality program, and the controls you apply to custodial funds (segregation of duties, daily reconciliation, independent audit).
8. Team and places of performance. Identify proposed major subcontractors and the states in which work, including remote work, would be performed.
9. Financial capability. State whether the firm could finance a nine-month Start-Up Period with payment on completion, and any conditions.
This is not a solicitation. FAR Part 10 market research; FAR 15.201(e). | Page 8 of 12
5. Information Requested — Industry Questions (Attachment 1, tab 3) Answer the questions that apply to your firm; partial responses are welcome. Where you recommend a change, state the change and the reason. Answers may be attributed to your firm in OPM's market research report but will not be released publicly with attribution.
5.1 Requirements — completeness and gaps
10. Reviewing Section 3 and Attachment 2 (the 2022 requirements matrix), identify any function, deliverable, control, interface, or service that OPM has not listed but that you consider standard for a benefits enrollment and premium administration program of this scale, and explain why it should be specified.
11. Identify any listed requirement that you consider obsolete, duplicative, or better expressed as an outcome, and propose the replacement language.
12. Identify any requirement or description that appears to presume a specific system, tool, process, vendor, or the current provider's way of operating, and describe how OPM could state it neutrally without losing the outcome it protects.
13. What Government-furnished information would you need to price and plan with confidence (for example, file layouts, historical volumes by month, handle time and contact drivers, record counts, system boundary and categorization, current performance results), and at what point in the process?
5.2 Performance standards
14. For each draft standard in Attachment 1 tab 4, indicate whether it is achievable at the baseline volumes, the standard you meet on comparable programs, and how you define and measure it (including exclusions such as short abandons or the last day of Open Season).
15. List performance standards OPM has not included that you would expect for this program — for example, digital channel service levels (web chat, callback, secure message), self-service containment, first-contact resolution, data quality and reconciliation-break aging, payment processing exceptions (ACH returns, card declines), accessibility conformance rates, security patch timeliness, or Open Season readiness measures — and state the level you would consider acceptable.
16. Comment on the proposed approach to performance deductions (deductions tied to specific standards, capped as a percentage of the period's service fees, with a corrective action period and written rebuttal), including how you have seen incentives or deductions structured effectively elsewhere.
5.3 Transition-in (Start-Up Period)
17. Is a Start-Up Period of approximately nine months from award to full services sufficient to achieve ATO, certify interfaces with more than fifty payroll providers and all carriers and administrators, convert approximately seven million records after Open Season closes, and staff and train the operation? Identify the critical path and the Government and incumbent actions on which it depends.
18. Describe the data conversion approach you would propose (mock conversions, reconciliation controls, cutover after Open Season with all records converted together) and the risks you see.
19. What cooperation would you need from the outgoing contractor and from the FSAFEDS and FLTCIP Administrators, and how should OPM secure it contractually?
This is not a solicitation. FAR Part 10 market research; FAR 15.201(e). | Page 9 of 12
5.4 Technical approach, security, and accessibility
20. Comment on hosting the solution in a FedRAMP-authorized cloud versus on premises, the impact level you would expect (OPM anticipates Moderate), and the elapsed time you would plan for OPM's authorization process.
21. Comment on OPM's interest in using login.gov for enrollee identity proofing and authentication, including integration effort and any populations (annuitants, uniformed-service retirees, overseas customers) for whom alternatives would be needed.
22. Describe how your solution exchanges data with payroll providers, carriers, and administrators today (batch files, APIs, secure file transfer), and any interface standard you recommend OPM adopt.
23. Describe how you achieve and maintain WCAG 2.1 AA conformance across web, mobile, and document channels and how you test with assistive technology.
24. Describe any use of artificial intelligence or automation you would propose (for example in the IVR, web chat, correspondence drafting, quality monitoring, translation, or fraud detection), how you would govern it (human review, transparency to customers, data handling, accuracy and bias testing), and how you would comply with Federal AI policy on a Federal system.
5.5 Contract structure and pricing
25. Comment on firm-fixed service fees per enrollment, account, or payor per pay period and on the use of pre-priced optional line items for growth beyond stated bands (additional carriers, payroll interfaces, contact volume). In particular, should transition-in costs be separately priced and paid on completion of Start-Up, or recovered through the service fees over the contract term, and how would each approach affect your price and your willingness to compete? Would a different structure produce better pricing or lower risk for the Government?
26. What contract length, including options, would you consider necessary to recover transition investment at competitive fee levels?
27. Identify the requirements or risks that would most affect your price, and any information OPM could provide to reduce contingency pricing.
5.6 Competition and barriers to entry
28. Identify any aspect of the anticipated requirement, evaluation approach, or schedule that would prevent your firm from competing or that appears to favor a particular solution or provider, and describe how OPM could address it while still meeting its objectives.
29. Comment on the anticipated two-phase evaluation approach and on minimum-experience criteria:
what measures of comparable experience (lives administered, interfaces operated, premium volume, transaction volume, Federal or non-Federal) would fairly establish capability without excluding qualified firms?
30. Would oral presentations, system demonstrations, or a draft RFP for comment improve your ability to propose? What response time would you need after solicitation release?
5.7 Small business participation
31. For small businesses: which functions (for example, contact center operations, communications, software development and testing, data conversion, security assessment, training, mail and print) could your firm perform as a prime or subcontractor, at what scale, and with what teaming arrangements?
This is not a solicitation. FAR Part 10 market research; FAR 15.201(e). | Page 10 of 12
32. For all respondents: is a small business participation requirement of 30 percent of total contract value achievable, and which functions are most suitable for small business performance?
5.8 Additional comments
33. Provide any other comment, question, or recommendation OPM should consider in finalizing the requirement or the acquisition approach.
34. Comment on the appropriateness of NAICS 524292 (versus 541611 or another code) for this requirement.
6. Response Instructions
• Submit responses by email to James.Faulkner@opm.gov and Dennis.Hodges@opm.gov no later than 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday, October 26, 2026, with the subject line "BENEFEDS SSN/RFI Response — [Company Name]". Late responses may not be considered.
• Submit Attachment 1 as a completed Excel workbook (do not convert to PDF) and the capability statement as a PDF or Word document, 8.5 x 11 inches, 11-point font or larger, 15 pages maximum (5 pages for teaming-only responses). Total email size must not exceed 25 MB; split across emails if necessary and number them.
• Mark proprietary information on each page where it appears. Do not include pricing except in response to Section 5.5 in general terms.
• Questions about this notice must be emailed to both points of contact by 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Wednesday, October 14, 2026. OPM will post answers to questions of general interest as an amendment to this notice on SAM.gov; the identity of the questioner will not be disclosed.
• OPM may invite selected respondents to 30-minute virtual one-on-one sessions during the week of November 2, 2026 to clarify responses (FAR 15.201(c)). Sessions are at OPM's discretion, are not evaluations, and confer no advantage in any future competition.
• All communication regarding this notice is through the two points of contact above; do not contact other OPM personnel.
7. Attachments and Reference Material
Attachment Content Use
Attachment 1 — Respondent Information and Questionnaire (Excel)
Tab 1 respondent information; tab 2 capability matrix by functional area; tab 3 industry questions (Section 5);
tab 4 draft performance standards with comment columns; tab 5 baseline data; tab 6 "What OPM has not listed" — a structured table for additional requirements and standards.
Required response format;
enables consistent analysis across respondents.
Attachment 2 — Requirements Traceability Matrix (2022 baseline)
The system requirements and business rules published with the 2022 solicitation (288 requirements in 18 functional areas), provided for context. It will be revised for the follow-on.
Reference for Questions 5.1.1 and 5.1.2.
Attachment 3 — Roles and Responsibilities Matrix (2022 baseline)
Allocation of enrollment, premium administration, customer service, correspondence, and reporting functions among the contractor, carriers and administrators, customers, and OPM.
Reference for scope boundaries.
This is not a solicitation. FAR Part 10 market research; FAR 15.201(e). | Page 11 of 12
Attachment Content Use
Reference — 2022 solicitation 24361821R0002 and amendments
Available in the SAM.gov contract opportunities archive. The follow-on requirement is being rewritten;
the archived documents should not be assumed to describe it.
Historical context only.
OPM appreciates industry's time and candor. Responses that identify what the Government has missed are the most valuable responses it can receive at this stage.
This is not a solicitation. FAR Part 10 market research; FAR 15.201(e). | Page 12 of 12
| 1. Purpose of This Notice |
| 2. Background |
| 3. Anticipated Requirement |
| 3.1 Objectives |
| 3.2 Scope of Services |
| 3.3 Program Environment and Baseline Volumes |
| 3.4 Anticipated Contract Structure and Schedule |
| 3.5 Draft Performance Standards |
| 4. Information Requested — Business and Capability Information |
| 4.1 Respondent information (Attachment 1, tab 1) |
| 4.2 Capability statement (narrative, 15 pages maximum) |
| 5. Information Requested — Industry Questions (Attachment 1, tab 3) |
| 5.1 Requirements — completeness and gaps |
| 5.2 Performance standards |
| 5.3 Transition-in (Start-Up Period) |
| 5.4 Technical approach, security, and accessibility |
| 5.5 Contract structure and pricing |
| 5.6 Competition and barriers to entry |
| 5.7 Small business participation |
| 5.8 Additional comments |
| 6. Response Instructions |
| 7. Attachments and Reference Material |
File details come from the government source that posted it. Updated .