Answered Questions - IDIQ11012.pdf

Answered Questions submitted for IDIQ11012

1. The FBO listing for this solicitation (IDIQ11012) states no set aside, but page 1 of the actual document has “8a” marked. What is the correct classification?

8(a) is the correct classification.

2. What version of Microsoft Word is to be used in preparing the response to this solicitation?

See changes under Instructions for Submitting Proposals.

3. Attachment 2 Past Performance – Part 1 says “The completed questionnaires should be forwarded by email directly from the Offerors reference to Elizabeth Elmazahi at Elizabeth.Elmazahi@hhs.gov.” However, Part 2 says “Please complete the questionnaire and provide an electronic copy of it to Bridget Gauer by March 5, 2012 at bridget.gauer@hhs.gov .” Is this mean our reference should send the Part 1 to Elizabeth Elmazahi and Part 2 to Bridget Gauer? It seems Part1 and Part 2 are part of one document. Please clarify.

See changes under Attachment 2 – Past Performance Contact Information Sheet and Questionnaire.

4. Could you please clarify the minimum Font Size requirements?

5. In regards to Graphics presentations, including pricing and page size restrictions, could you please confirm that: 1. 11 X 17 pages are not subject to the margin and page size restrictions? 2. A single-sided 11 X 17 page is counted as 1 page OR 2 pages towards the 30 page limit on Technical Approach? 3. A double-sided 11 X 17 page is counted as 2 pages OR 4 pages towards the 30 page limit on Technical Approach?

6. Page 79; past performance: we understand that you need up to 3 past performances. If we are using a subcontractor, can we use their past performance along with the prime contractor’s past performance?

See paragraph entitled Past Performance on page 79.

7. Are there a minimum number of past performances we should provide for prime as well as the subcontractor?

There is not a minimum number of past performance evaluations required for subcontractors.

8. Estimated Budget / Dollar Value for this Purchase?

The maximum ceiling price for this contract including all option periods is $17 Million.

9. Any Extension of Bidding Deadline?

The time for submitting proposals is extended until March 22, 2012.

mailto:Elizabeth.Elmazahi@hhs.gov�

10. Page 77; instructions for submitting proposals: Where should the proposals be submitted (Physical Address or electronic submission)? Are we correct in understanding that the proposal should be submitted in two separate binders (two parts)? How many copies of each part are required (electronic and/or hard copies)?

We strongly encourage that you provide only electronic copies but if electronic submission poses a burden then hard copies can be mailed to: 330 Independence Avenue, SW, Room G640, Washington, DC 20201.

11. According to 5.2.1.2 Transition Period - Upon award of this task, the Contractor will assume responsibilities of the work over a Transition Period that shall last no more than 30 days from the date of contract award. Attachment 3 - Task Order 1 Schedule of Services and Supplies for Task Order 1 CLIN 2 states, “Provide all services as stated in the attached statement of work (After Completion of the transition period for 12 months). Could you please confirm the intent of CLIN 2 is to: “Provide all services as stated in the attached statement of work (For the first 12 month period after the conclusion of the initial 30 day transition period)? If so, could you please amend CLIN 2 to make it clearer?

See changes under Attachment 3 – Task Order 1.

12. Can you please provide the past performance survey in Word format?

See attached.

13. Do you need a breakdown of the cost included in the table given in page 90 for Task Order 1?

See changes under Instructions for Submitting Proposals, Factor 3: Price.

• If so, do you need the labor categories used, their hourly rate and estimated hours? Yes.

• Are these the same labor categories that we should use for the table given on page 1; section1? Yes.

• Can we include additional labor categories for future task orders in this table? Yes.

14. What geographic area will be covered by this contract?

Washington DC Metro area

15. Can the Government confirm that Task Order 1 will be Firm Fixed Price?

Task Order 1 is now Time and Materials.

16. Are there other tasks envisioned to support surge operations, and if so, how many can be accommodated in the current ceiling limit?

At this time only Task Order 1 is guaranteed.

17. There appears to be a discrepancy between, Paragraph 10 KEY PERSONNEL REQUIREMENTS and Instructions for Submitting Proposals - Technical Approach.

Could you please clarify which personnel are considered key personnel as part of this solicitation? Part II: Technical Approach states that the offeror shall identify the key personnel it proposes to use in the performance of this effort. Is it the government’s intent to designate only the Program Manager as key? OR are additional personnel that the offeror intends to use in the performance of this effort key personnel?

See changes under paragraph 10 – Key Personnel Requirements.

18. Please confirm our understanding that a fully compliant Technical Approach section within Part II includes a physical inventory of separate and divided sections consisting of: Draft Program Management Plan; Technical Approach to Work addressed in Task Order 1; Key Personnel; Resumes of Key Personnel; Letters of Intent and Availability.

That is correct.

19. Any Addendum or Pre Bid meeting Minutes?

No pre bid meeting was held.

20. Is there an incumbent contractor on this solicitation? If so:

• Who are they? Apprio Inc.

• What is their contract number? HHSO100201000027C;

HHSO100200800042C; HHSP233200800574G

• Are they eligible to compete on this solicitation? Competition is open to all eligible 8(a) businesses.

21. Is this a follow-on requirement?

This is a recompete of three separate contracts.

22. Can you please confirm this to be a single award IDIQ or do you envision this to be a multiple-award contract?

Single award IDIQ

23. Does the offeror need to include Past Performance summary information (e.g. contract number, period of performance, etc.) and narrative description of the work performed in volume Part II?

Yes.

• Will this inclusion count against the 30 page limit?

Past performance documents will not count against page limits.

24. Can you please confirm the time of day proposal submissions are currently due on

3/5/2012? There is no reference to it in block 8 of page 1 of the solicitation.

Proposals are due by Mar 22, 2012 3:00 pm Eastern.

25. Please confirm the NAICS Code of 541511 applies? It was not listed in Block 10 of page

1 of the solicitation.

Yes, NAICS Code 541511 applies

26. In Section 1, Page 3, Paragraph 2, line 5: There is a reference to “FCC’s”. For what/whom is this an acronym?

See changes under Statement of Work, Section 1, Page 3, Paragraph 2, line 5.

27. Can you provide the number of contractor FTE’s under each of the above mentioned prime contracts, (should there be multiple prime contractors) or the number of contractor FTE’s under the current single contract for providing development, maintenance and/or support for the above referenced systems?

3-6 FTEs

• Page 100; Section 5.20; DMIS Application development: what is the existing effort or the anticipated effort for this task (either FTEs or dollar amount)?

Depends on mission tempo, steady state 400-500hr/m, during response the 24/7 support is new to this contract. No estimates available.

28. What is the current ASPR Change Management Process?

See section 5.2.12 Change Management and Stakeholder Relationship (pg 12 of 104)

29. Per Section 17 - Appendix with details of various systems was not included in the solicitation. Could that please be provided?

See Attachment 4: NDMS RMS and DMIS Overview

30. What types of healthcare providers will be included under this contract?

For Credentialing, please see attachment. Up to 20 professional healthcare providers may be added to this list.

31. Can you share the architecture, operating system, and software specifications for each of the different systems (e.g. RMS and DMIS) to be supported under this NDMS contract?

See Attachment 4: NDMS RMS and DMIS Overview

32. Are the system applications to be supported under this contract hosted by HHS (or their designate) or to be hosted by the contractor?

Hosted by DHHS.

33. Has the work stipulated under Attachment 3 already been completed in part (pg. 96, ‘Credentialing Interface’ paragraph stipulates “by the end of 2011”).

It has not yet been completed.

34. Can the CMMI 2 requirement be fulfilled by a partner or sub contractor’s CMMI certification?

Formal certification in CMMI, ISO-9001, or Project Management Institute OPM3 is intended as demonstrate organizational maturity. One of the three certifications as noted “shall be a record of organization maturity

35. Does the prime have to be CMMI certified by the contract award or by proposal submission?

Formal certification in CMMI, ISO-9001, or Project Management Institute OPM3 is intended as demonstrate organizational maturity. One of the three certifications as noted “shall be a record of organization maturity”. Demonstration of any of the three certifications should be in place at the time of proposal submission.

36. Contractor personnel: is it expected that any of the contractor personnel will require any form of security clearance greater than "position of public trust"", if so for which positions / projects? Are any national security clearances required?

Public trust clearance will be needed. See paragraph 16 of the statement of work.

• Page 78; part II Technical Approach: what kind of Security clearance is required for the contract personnel? See answer above.

• Can you please clarify that the contractor personnel can be US Citizen, Green Card holders or individuals with valid work permit to work in US?

Foreign Nationals may work in a public trust position. The personal security handbook is available at: http://www.hhs.gov/ohr/manual/pssh.pdf

37. Contractor will perform all the work on the contractor's premises. We assume the applications and hardware infrastructure are deployed in HHS data centers.

• Please confirm all infrastructure costs for all environments (development, test, production) including hardware, software licenses, and data center operations are covered by HHS and are not to be included in the proposed budget This will be determined on a scale of work and task orders and will be determined after the business requirements process is completed.

• Please describe any special provisions we must accommodate to allow remote access to the systems on which the applications are developed and deployed and for the purposes of deploying those applications.

HHS must grant VPN access

38. Do you require all the contractor personnel to be located within certain distance from your location or within the metro DC area?

No specific distance, but contractor should able to have personnel on site within 2 hours.

• Can we have part or all of the team members located at a contractor location outside the DC area, but within the US?

The team needs to be responsive to the near term needs of NDMS and mission tempo.

• Is it acceptable to attend the meeting via conference call most of the time and plan for face to face meetings occasionally?

It is not acceptable to attend meetings via conference “most” of the time. It is expected that during initial year that face to face meetings will be preferred, as the work matures, convenience calls will be acceptable dependent on the situation.

39. Is it possible to be more precise in Section 5.20 DMIS Application Development as to which functionality currently exists and for which we will provide on-going support, and which functionality is to be developed?

See attached system descriptions, further development will depend on program needs and the EPLC process.

40. What work do you contemplate that would result in a subpoena? (Confidential Reports, Data And procedures pg 19 of 107) Not anticipated, but some work is subject to FOIA

41. Will the offeror be responsible for moving code revision tracking in the Government controlled environment?

Yes

42. Have you prioritized the tasks given in the SOW to be completed during the course of this contract?

Yes

• If so, are you going to disclose them after the contract award?

• If not, is it the contractor’s responsibility to prioritize and include them in the updated project schedule after the contract award?

No

43. Page 93; section 5.6; how many predefined reports and ad-hoc reports do you anticipate to be developed?

The requirement for ad-hoc reports is situational. This will be determined when the business requirements for system updates and changes.

44. Page 92; Section 5.6; Responder and team management module: What platform (hardware, software, and database) is currently used to develop this application?

See above

• Where is this application hosted currently? HHS

• Where do you intend to host this application after the enhancements are completed? HHS

• Do you anticipate us to host and include the cost for hosting in the price proposal? No

• Is the current application web based? Yes

• What is the number of users currently using this application?

• NDMS 8784

• OFRD 8110

• Tell 815

• Other 53

• What was the level of effort (time, FTEs or dollar amount) for developing the current application until this stage?

N/A with T&M

• Bullet item 6, under this section states that there would be additional tasks as directed by the COTR. Are these tasks going to be included in future task orders which will be priced later?

45. Page 93; Section 5.7; Responder Credentialing: Are we correct in assuming that the three systems mentioned in this section, HPDP, HIPDP and ESAR-VHP, are external system to Responder and Team Management? Yes

• What platform are these external systems developed on?

These are systems that are external to NMDS

• The interface to these external systems: are they new interfaces or are we modifying the existing interfaces?

Modifying links to these systems

46. Page 95; Section 5.9; Deployment Management: Is this a new system that will be developed under this task order?

Yes, as noted in paragraph 2

• When mention fiscal year 2011; are you referring to September 2012? Yes

• Does the call down functionality include all channels, such as email, telephone and SMS? Or any one of them?

Only email is included, the others are desired for future integration.

• Should we include the telephony integration in the price estimates as part of the planned external systems? Yes

47. Page 95; Section 5.10; Responder Self Service: Is this a new system that will be developed under this task order? The timeline for credential interfacing is stated as end of fiscal year 2011, does it mean September 2012? Miscellaneous data calls/surveys:

How many questionnaires, forms and data calls are required to be made available online?

Although near completion, the system will require continued development.

48. Page 96; Section 5.11; are we correct in assuming that IRCT database is an existing application?

49. Page 96; Section 5.11; the last paragraph states that the contractor should support DRCS. Can you elaborate on the support tasks required under this solicitation?

Integration of systems noted in paragraph and any new systems licensed for DRCS.

50. Page 97; Section 5.12; Responder Health and Safety; what kind of information is tracked in the health and safety assessments? How frequently is this information tracked?

Occupational medicine is tracked on an on-going basis for all responders in NDMS (Approx.

8000 personnel). Information is updated approx. every 3 months.

51. Page 97; Section 5.13; Help Desk; what is the anticipated call volume for the help desk?

Is this going to be a new help desk support service or are we transitioning from the existing support?

This is going to be a new help desk support service. The volume is unknown.

52. Page 97; Section 5.14; Training; what is the frequency of the training sessions?

Varies based on mission and deployment

• How many attendees are anticipated for each training session?

Varies 10-400

53. Page 98; Section 5.16; what is the size of the database? What is the database software used (oracle, SQL Server, etc)?

Oracle

54. Page 99; Section 5.19a; technical support; are you expecting us to give a fixed price estimate assuming that 24/7/365 support is required all the time? Or do you want us to build into the estimate an approximate percentage of time for the likelihood of a critical incident?

See changes under Task Order 1.

55. Page 100; Section 5.21; DMIS database administration and support; are you expecting us to give a fixed price estimate assuming that 24/7/365 support is required all the time?

Or do you want us to build into the estimate an approximate percentage of time for the likelihood of a critical incident?

See answer to #54

56. Page 1; Section B1: do you want us to list all the potential labor categories that could be used under any task order?

Yes the offeror shall provide the proposed labor categories considering the work defined in the SOW.

57. Does the prime required to have the certification or the subcontractor with CMMI Level 2, or ISO 9001, or PMI OPM3 (Section 5.1 Program Management) be sufficient enough?

See answers to #34 and #35

58. What is the frequency of application changes, enhancements and modifications?

Major version changes and enhancements every other year for each system. Modifications may be required.

59. What group or organization is currently responsible for application development? Is this expected to change during the contract duration?

OPEO

60. Will the contractor be responsible for any application development? (Page 10 references web-work and development and integration of applications.)

61. Where are the applications hosted or resident today? Is this expected to change during the contract duration?

The applications are hosted with HHS. This is not expected to change.

62. Is the new contractor required to provide the hardware infrastructure?

No

63. Are the applications fully 508 compliant today? (Page 11) Yes, the most recent run against the toolset was on June 8, 2011. SortSite and JAWS are periodically run the tools against the development instance to determine compatibility, accessibility and usability issues. EMR would not be included since it is a closed thick client application

64. What is the current and expected volume of interfaces that are required for compilation / validation of response / responder data, such as medical credentialing and privileging?

The number will vary based on response.

65. What systems in addition to RMS and DMS require support? What is the frequency of application changes, enhancements and modifications to these systems? (Page 12 –

5.2.13 Functional Support)

Credentialing & Privileging

66. Are monitoring tools currently in use and will they be available within the new contract?

Monitoring tools are provided by the Government and not part of this contract.

67. Are emergency contacts to be personal or professional?

See revised language in section 5.6 of the Task Order SOW.

68. What data is needed in regards to immunizations, drivers licenses and passports?

69. Is “certifications” referring to board certification by an AMA or AOA board? If not, what is it referring to?

70. What exactly is meant by “skills”?

71. Where do we get this information from?

72. Is a background check required for every provider or only those who fail the screening process using the DOD TOM guidelines?

All federal intermittent employees get background checks.

73. Is it a requirement to query the HIPDB since all this information can be obtain through the HPDB [NPDB], AMA Masterfile data, criminal history background check if required for each provider, the OIG and GSA? (Section 5.7 Responder credentialing) NPDB query is required. Criminal background history is not required as it is done through initial hire via HR.

74. If we verify the provider’s credentials (licensure, DEA, CDS, highest level of training in practicing specialty, malpractice, Medicare/Medicaid sanctions, etc…) do we have to also verify ESAR-VHP registration through the state too? Are the State Licensing NDMS Support SOW Agencies the same as the State Licensing boards?

No, there is no need to verify ESAR through the state if other verification was completed then there may be a need to cross-reference providers on teams with state ESAR VIP systems. Yes, the State licensing NDMS Support SOW Agencies are the same as the State Licensing Boards.

75. What system is being referred to, DMIS? If so, how is access obtained and who will have access?

N/A

76. What volume of responder credentialing and verification is expected of the contractor?

(Page 93) Approx. 5500-6500 credentialed providers every 3 years

77. Who pays for things like background checks for the credentialing process, PCs, phone system, telecom, etc.? Are those billed at cost? Doesn't seem like they should be part of the labor rates.

The Government will pay for background checks. Please see amended RFP.

78. What exactly is the contractor responsible for in regards to maintaining, updating and testing since we’re not a State ESAR-VHP?

ESAR VIP Module updates: the contractor will maintain, test, and update the ESAR-VHP module. The contractor will not be responsible for performing any functions of the state ESAR-VHP systems. The ESAR-VHP module is a secure web file sharing application. The contractor will be responsible for the maintaining, updating, and testing of secure web file sharing application. State ESAR-VHP program will use the web application to share the credential information of health professionals solicited during disasters or public health emergencies. The system will allow users to upload files to a secure storage area that can be easily shared securely via the Internet.

79. What is meant by “maintain and update” for the ESAR-VHP Credentialing Module?

(Page 95 Section 5.9 Deployment Management) The contractor will be responsible for maintaining the web application referenced in question

no. See answer above to #78. See updates under 5.8 ESAR-VHP Credentialing Module.

80. Was the “call down functionality” delivered and operational by the end of fiscal year 2011? Are enhancements planned?

(Page 95 – Deployment Management) Same for the Credentialing Interface. (Page 96 Section

5.10 Responder Self Service)

81. What integration is required for the Meeting Place voice and web conferencing to enable its operation?

See Section 5.10 Responder Self Service

82. What is the scope of “web portal management” referenced in 5.15 Systems

Administration and Documentation? (Page 97) See Section 5.15 Systems Administration and Documentation

83. What is the scope of application development highlighted in 5.17 DMIS Coordination, Development and State? What is currently available? What is new? (Page 98) See section 5.17 DMIS Coordination, Development and State Rollout

84. There are many sentences throughout Task One SOW that take the form "the ... portal will..." e.g. in Section 5.10 "the self-service site will be a web portal." No further instructions are provided as to the intended responsibilities of the offeror with respect to the contents of these sentences. How should these sentences be interpreted?

• The functionality mentioned is already developed and deployed and the offeror is to support the functionality only?

Further development and integration will be required for some of the toolkit and modules

• The functionality mentioned needs to be developed according to a full development life cycle?

Correct.

• The functionality mentioned needs to be developed in a totally new system e.g. responder Self Service portal?

Limited to new modules for the toolkit.

85. Additional information regarding the exact scope of the offeror's work with respect to those statements in the work that read simply "the system will..." without further statements that specify the actual responsibility of the offeror is required in order to clarify the exact nature of the work solicited. In this respect, if the answer to question 3 above is B or C, would the government please provide a listing of:

• What systems covered by Task One SOW are already developed and deployed?

TBD by HHS ELPC process and business case, DMIS (EMR, JPATS & HIR) RMS and credentialing all are developed and deployed but will need further refinement and updates dependent on T&M.

• For each system covered by Task One SOW already developed and deployed, what additional functionality needs to be developed according to a full development life cycle?

TBD by HHS ELPC process and business case.

• What systems covered by Task One SOW need to be developed in their entirety from scratch?

TBD by HHS ELPC process and business case.