HCA Approved LSJ.pdf

DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS

FAR 8.405-6 – Limited Sources Justification (LSJ) >SAT

Acquisition Plan Action ID: 36C10D-22-AP-0026

(1) Agency and Contracting Activity:

Veterans Benefits Administration Office of Mission Support – Acquisition Division Central Office Contracting Team 1800 G Street NW Washington, DC 20006

(2) Description of Action: This acquisition is conducted under the authority of the Multiple- Award Schedule Program (41 U.S.C. 152(3) and 40 U.S.C. 501).

The action being approved in this justification document is issuance on a sole source basis of a firm-fixed-price task order under Federal Supply Schedule (FSS) contract GS-03F-022DA. The subject task order is for the services described in Section 3 of this document, below, which will be used by the Department of Veterans Affairs’ (VA) Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA) to obtain private medical records that can be used in determining VBA claimants’ entitlement to benefits.

Name of Contractor: DOMA Technologies LLC FSS Contract Number: GS-03F-022DA Address: 841 Seahawk Circle City, State, Zip: Virginia Beach, Virginia 23452 Phone/Email: 757-306-4922

(3) Description of Supplies or Services:

The services that VA has determined are required to meet its needs, and which it will obtain under the subject task order, are as described in this section.

VBA administers the Compensation Service (CS) and Pension and Fiduciary Service (P&F) for benefits to Veterans, their dependents, and their survivors. Entitlement determinations for disability compensations claims and disability pension claims are made by employees working in VBA offices. When processing certain disability claims, VBA utilizes private medical records to establish continuity of treatment of the Veteran or claimant’s claimed disability condition.

VBA’s Private Medical Records (PMR) Retrieval Program was deployed nationally in November 2014. The process includes the following primary activities:

http://uscode.house.gov/browse.xhtml;jsessionid=114A3287C7B3359E597506A31FC855B3 https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/USCODE-2011-title40/pdf/USCODE-2011-title40-subtitleI-chap5-subchapI-sec501.pdf

• The Contractor receives the Veterans Affairs Form (VAF) 21-4142, “Authorization and Consent to Release Information to the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)” or its equivalent (facility specific release of information) and attempts to retrieve private medical records on behalf of VA

• The Contractor provides the Veteran or claimant with written notification of the development actions taken to obtain the medical records

• The Contractor documents each attempt to obtain records on a VAF 21-0820, “Report of General Information”

• The Contractor receives, scans if received as paper, indexes, and securely transfers all PMR related documents to VBA’s Centralized Mail portal for upload into the Veteran or claimant’s electronic file

The current PMR retrieval service regularly obtains between 20,000 – 25,000 PMRs monthly from domestic and international Private Health Providers (PHP). The Government anticipates a continued need for this service.

Services that will be provided by DOMA Technologies, LLC, will include:

• Program Management, Change Control, Invoicing, Auditing, Quality Assurance, Security Management, CPI, meeting minutes, training support, documentation, including 2,000 development hours for enhancements to the portal

• Operation of PMR Portal

• Help Desk Support

• Delivery of searchable PDF converted copies of private medical records sent to VBA and stored in the Contractor’s web portal

• Reports on Negative or Non-Response to PMR requests

• Delivery and mailing costs for generated letters

• SFTP File Transfers

• Transition-Out Services

The intended period of performance for this sole source is from February 18, 2022 to February 17, 2023. The total estimated value of the proposed action is $10,626,723.84.

(4) Identify the Authority and Supporting Rationale

FAR 8.405-6(a)(1)(A): An urgent and compelling need exists and following the ordering procedures would result in unacceptable delays:

FAR 8.405-6(a)(1)(B): Only one source is capable of providing the supplies or services required at the level of quality required because the supplies or services are unique or highly specialized;

FAR 8.405-6(a)(i)(1)(C): In the interest of economy and efficiency, the new work is a logical follow-on to an original Federal Supply Schedule order provided that the original order was placed in accordance with the applicable Federal Supply Schedule ordering procedures. The original order must not have been previously issued under sole source or limited source procedures.

The task order that is the subject of this justification is for work that is a follow-on to an original task order for the same suite of services pertaining to private medical records retrieval. That original task order, 36C10E18F0297, was issued to DOMA Technologies LLC under FSS contract GS-03F-022DA after conducting a competitive process in accordance with all applicable FSS procedures, including those set forth at FAR 8.405-2 for orders that exceed the simplified acquisition threshold. An RFQ was posted on e-Buy to afford all schedule contractors offering the required services under the appropriate multiple-award schedule(s) an opportunity to submit a quote, and VA fairly considered all quotes received and awarded the task order in accordance with the evaluation criteria in the RFQ.

The new work to be performed under the subject task order is a logical follow-on to the work that has been, and is, being performed under the original task order

The original task order was issued on August 18, 2018. Inclusive of options exercised, its period of performance will have lasted from issuance through expiration on February 17, 2022. Under that task order, DOMA Technologies LLC, has been and is presently conducting the exact same work described in Section 3, that will be continued under the follow-on task order that’s the subject of this justification.

Issuing this task order for follow-on work to the incumbent currently performing the same work is in the interest of economy and efficiency

The existing case law interpreting FAR 8.405–6(a)(1)(i)(C) supports the proposition that an agency can reasonably determine that issuing a task order for logical follow-on work to the incumbent that has been performing the same work is in the interest of economy and efficiency within the meaning of the foregoing FAR provision when the agency reasonably determines that having the incumbent perform the follow-on work will avoid disruptions in services that would have a detrimental effect on the accomplishment of the agency’s mission or will avoid wasteful duplication of effort on the part of the agency. As explained below, both of those determinations have been reasonably made with regard to having the incumbent continue to perform these mission-critical services facilitating timely retrieval and review of private medical records

The effort to transition these services to a new vendor would require new resource staffing and the development/transfer of a new system to track/manage PMRs. These activities, which could cost the VA millions of dollars in additional investment and would present the unacceptably high risk of a stoppage in services which would be detrimental to the VBA claims development process. Based on historical precedence it is known that it can take up to a year for the implementation of a private medical record management platform that is successful at processing transactions. This interruption would cause a backlog of the processing of all VBA claims where the claimant submits a request for VA to obtain private medical records and would delay impacted Claimants in receiving the entitlements that they are due.

For Brand Name only:

FAR 8.405-6(b): Items peculiar to one manufacturer. An item peculiar to one manufacturer can be a particular brand name, product, or a feature of a product, peculiar to one manufacturer. A brand name item, whether available on one or more schedule contracts, is an item peculiar to one manufacturer.

(5) Describe Why You Determined the Order Represents the Best Value consistent with FAR 8.404(d):

Only DOMA Technologies, LLC, can provide these critical services without significant impact to economy and efficiency, and potential interruption of services. DOMA can provide the required services at a fair and reasonable price to the government. The quoted task order pricing is in line with the Independent Government Cost Estimate (IGCE) and historical pricing under competitively awarded task order 36C10E18F0297. An analysis has also been conducted to ensure that the proposed level of effort and mix of labor is appropriate for the contemplated work.

(6) Describe the Market Research Conducted among schedule holders and the results or a statement of the reason market research was not conducted.

Due to the reasons outlined elsewhere in this justification, substantive market research to identify additional GSA schedule holders was not conducted.

(7) Any Other Facts Supporting the Justification:

No additional facts.

(8) A Statement of the Actions, if any, the agency may take to remove or overcome any barriers that led to the restricted consideration before any subsequent acquisition for the supplies or services is made:

VBA is currently in the planning phase for a new long-term contract for Private Medical Records Retrieval Services. A competitive process for a future long-term contract will be conducted.

(9) Requirements Certification: I certify that the requirement outlined in this justification is a Bona Fide Need of the Department of Veterans Affairs and that the supporting information under my cognizance, which are included in the justification, are accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge.

Christopher Colvin Senior Program Analyst Veterans Benefits Administration

(10) Approvals:

a. Contracting Officer’s Certification (required): I certify that the foregoing justification is accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief.

Jonathan Latson Contracting Officer

b. Supervisory Contract Specialist (required for actions valued >SAT-$750K): I certify that the foregoing justification is accurate and complete to the best of my knowledge and belief and approve.

Alyssa Dark Chief of the Contracting Office

HIGHER LEVEL APPROVAL (required for actions over $750K):

c. VBA’s Competition Advocate (delegated to the Head of Contracting Activity) / Head of

Procuring Activity Approval: (>$750K to $75M): I have reviewed the foregoing justification and find it to be complete and accurate to the best of my knowledge and belief and approve.

Matthew J. Manning Competition Advocate and Head of Contracting Activity