J.2 Instructions to Offerors and Basis for Award.pdf

Supplies, Services, and Material Management Division Ford House Office Building, Room H2-263 Washington, DC 20515 202.226.2557 www.aoc.gov

Architect of the Capitol | Supplies, Services, and Material Management Division Ford House Office Building, Room H2-263 | Washington, DC 20515 | 202.226.2557 | www.aoc.gov

Instructions to Offerors and Basis for Award

AOCSSB23R0032

Release Date: 03/22/2023

The Architect of the Capitol (AOC), Supplies, Services, and Material Management Division (SSMMD) is issuing Request for Proposals (RFP) # AOCSSB23R0032 for an agency-wide Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract. It is anticipated that this RFP will result in a single award, Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity contract with Firm Fixed Price Task Orders to a responsible Offeror actively registered in the System for Award Management (SAM) and whose proposal provides the overall best value to the AOC in accordance with the requirements set forth by this solicitation and the Statement of Work (SOW). This solicitation will use the procedures in AOC Contracting Manual § 9.1 Negotiated Acquisitions. The AOC Contracting Manual can be found here: https://www.aoc.gov/sites/default/files/2023-01/AOC- Order-34-1_Contracting-Manual-2022.pdf

The North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) codes for this requirement is 325998

– All Other Miscellaneous Chemical Product and Preparation Manufacturing. The Product Service Code is 6850 – Miscellaneous Chemical Specialties. The IDIQ period of performance will be 1 base year and 4 one-year options, for a total of five years from the date of award if all options are exercised. FAR 52.217-8 shall be included at the IDIQ level.

The List of Attachments is in Section J of Standard Form 33 (SF33).

L.1 RFP GENERAL CONDITIONS

The submission of a proposal to the Government shall constitute the offeror’s acknowledgement, agreement and compliance with the terms and conditions of the RFP. The Government will not be obligated to pay any cost incurred by a contractor in the preparation and submission of a proposal. Offerors are cautioned to ensure that their proposal submissions are complete and reflective of the evaluation criteria and requirements described herein.

Offerors are encouraged to provide their best terms with their initial proposal submission.

Offerors shall not assume that the Government will afford an opportunity to clarify, discuss, or revise a proposal. The Government reserves the right to conduct discussions if it determines that it is in the best interest of the Government.

http://www.aoc.gov/ https://www.aoc.gov/sites/default/files/2023-01/AOC-Order-34-1_Contracting-Manual-2022.pdf https://www.aoc.gov/sites/default/files/2023-01/AOC-Order-34-1_Contracting-Manual-2022.pdf

Proposals shall be valid for 120 days from the date of final proposal submission.

Any exceptions or conditional assumptions taken with respect to the requirements outlined in the RFP or SOW shall be fully explained in the offeror’s Introductory Letter. The Government cautions offerors that taking exception to any term or condition may render their proposal non-responsive and the offeror will be ineligible for award, unless the RFP expressly authorizes such an exception with regards to a specific term or condition.

An offeror’s proposal which does not price all items in Attachment J.3 or indicates that the offeror cannot provide all items in Attachment J.3 will be considered Unacceptable and not eligible for award.

L.2 QUESTIONS AND PROPOSAL SUBMISSIONS

All correspondence in conjunction with this solicitation, including questions and proposal submittals, shall be directed to the Contracting Officer, Roman Davydov, via e-mail at roman.davydov@aoc.gov. E-mail messages shall not exceed 20 MB. If necessary, offerors shall compress files with a .zip extension.

L.2.1 Questions Due Date

Questions about the technical or contractual details of this procurement must be submitted in writing via e-mail by April 05, 2023 at noon ET. When submitting questions, please include the RFP #, Company Name and the word “Questions” in the subject line of the email. For example, “AOCSSB23R0032_ABC Inc. Questions”. Questions submitted after this cut off will be responded to at the discretion of the Contracting Officer. Offerors shall use Attachment J.5 to submit questions.

Answers to questions will be provided as an amendment to the RFP.

L.2.2 Proposal Due Date

Proposals must be received no later than April 24, 2023 at noon ET. When submitting your final proposal, please include the RFP #, Company Name and the word “Proposal” in the subject line of the email. For example, “AOCSSB23R0032_ABC Inc. Proposal”. Proposals received after this date and time shall be considered late and shall not be accepted by the Government unless it is determined to be in the best interest of the Government.

L.3 VOLUMES AND ORGANIZATION

Proposals shall be clearly and concisely written, as well as being neat, indexed and logically assembled as described herein. Offerors are advised to supply all information in the sequence and format specified in the table below. The submitted proposal must provide a sufficient basis for a thorough evaluation and contain the information necessary for evaluation. The Government will not assume the offeror possesses any capability, understanding, or commitment not specified in the proposal. The proposal must not merely repeat the solicitation and Statement of Work requirements, but rather must provide convincing documentary evidence in support of conclusive statements of how contract requirements will be met.

Proposals shall be prepared in separate volumes: Volume I – Technical and Volume II – Price.

The offeror shall provide the requested information within the designated volume evaluation factor. Any requested information placed outside of the designated location shall not be considered or evaluated under that evaluation factor regardless of whether it is located somewhere else in the proposal. In order for the technical proposal to be strictly evaluated on the merit of the material submitted, Volume I and Volume II shall be submitted as separate documents. Pricing is prohibited in, and shall be omitted from, Volume I. Each volume shall be indexed by evaluation factor.

Volumes shall be organized in the following manner:

Volume Factor Title Page Limit (Not to Exceed)

I

NA Introductory Letter NA 1 Technical Approach 10 Pages 2 Key Personnel 3 Page resume 3 Corporate Experience 3 Pages per contract

4 Past Performance NA – to be provided by past customers

II 5 Price NA (in Excel) NA Standard Form 33 (Provision Fill-Ins) NA

All pages in Volume I, except the introductory letter, shall include page numbering.

Content which is outside the Page Limits in the above chart will not be considered by the Government during evaluations.

L.3.1 Paper Size and Formatting

Written materials shall be submitted 1 sided single spaced pages using standard 8 ½” x 11” size paper with a minimum of 1” margins. Font size shall be Times New Roman or Calibri with a minimum of 12-point size for text and 10-point size for tables and graphics.

L.3.2 Introductory Letter

The following introductory information is required before the first index of Volume I:

• RFP Number & Title;

• Name and address of offeror;

• Unique Entity Identifier (UEI Number) & cage code;

• NAICS / PSC;

• Name, telephone number & e-mail address of offeror’s main point-of-contact;

• Date of submission;

• Name, title and signature of authorized representative;

• All technical factor assumptions to the RFP and SOW shall be identified in this section.

Pricing assumptions shall be identified in Volume II. Exceptions identified in other areas of the proposal will not be considered.

L.3.3 Standard Form 33

The offeror shall complete Page 1 of the SF33 and all the provision fill-ins under Section K - Representations, Certifications, and other Statements of Offerors or Respondents. The entire form shall be returned in PDF format in Volume II. Any SF-30 associated with any amendments to this RFP shall be signed by the offeror and included in Volume II as well.

L.3.4 Factor 1 – Technical Approach

The offeror shall provide a technical approach plan in a narrative format that describes the offeror’s approach to managing and executing the requirements of the SOW. Offerors are cautioned that the submitted approach will be contractually binding.

The Technical Approach narrative shall reflect key management approaches, policies, and procedures to be implemented to ensure exceptional project management, delivery and quality control to complete the contract on-time, within budget and provide an approach which meets the requirements of SOW sections C.3 Scope of Work, C.5 Performance Areas, and C.6 Deliverables and Deliverables Schedule (For Each Task Order).

The technical approach shall describe:

a) Ability to provide details and information to indicate that they can manage a project of this magnitude.

b) Background of the company, number of employees and specialists.

c) Supply chain resiliency.

d) Sustainable product certification.

e) Training programs offered or included.

f) VMI implementation.

L.3.5 Factor 2 – Key Personnel

The offeror shall submit the resumes of all key personnel serving this contract, inclusive of key personnel identified in Section C.15 of the SOW. The resumes shall identify the experience, training and education to meet the requirements and qualifications described in the SOW. The contractor shall ensure dates are included for all experience, training, and education.

L.3.6 Factor 3 – Corporate Experience

The Quoter shall describe three (3) recent and relevant contracts for which the offeror was serving as the prime contractor which were completed within the past five (5) years or that are on-going, if on-going, the contract must have been performed for at least 24 months.

Contracts will be considered recent and relevant if they document completed work of a similar size, scope, magnitude, and complexity for a Government or private entity. Included details for each reference must include:

a) The organization’s name and address

b) Details for a point of contact (including telephone number, title and e-mail address)

c) Contract Total Dollar value

d) Contract Type (i.e Firm-Fixed Price, Time & Materials, or Cost Reimbursement)

e) Contract Period of performance

f) A brief description of the work, including – at minimum:

1) How the work was similar to and/or different from this requirement, including scale and complexity.

2) Whether the work was performed for a Government or private entity.

3) Any significant problems or issues that occurred during performance of the contract and how the Quoter resolved those issues.

L.3.7 Factor 4 – Past Performance

The Government is providing a Past Performance Questionnaire (PPQ) as an attachment to this solicitation (Attachment J.6) which the offeror shall provide to the past customer POC’s for each of the three past contracts identified under the Corporate Experience factor (L.3.6) for completion. The Government requests that the offeror submit the questionnaire to the POCs via email. All completed questionnaire forms must be emailed by the past customer POC directly to the Contracting Officer, Roman Davydov, at roman.davydov@aoc.gov by the due date and time of proposals.

L.3.8 Factor 5 – Price mailto:roman.davydov@aoc.gov

Offerors shall input the price per item in Attachment J.3 – IDIQ Pricelist. Estimated quantities are provided by the Government for purposes of price evaluation and shall not be changed, offerors shall input the price per items in the respective cells for the Base and all Option years, the total evaluated price for each tab and the total evaluated price for the IDIQ in the tab labeled “IDIQ Total Evaluated Price” will auto-calculate.

There are 8 tabs for all of the products and services under this IDIQ, please note the following information regarding each tab:

1) The Tab labeled “Cleaning Products”: The Unit of Measure for each product in this tab is “Each”, the total evaluated price for this Tab is in cell M34, the quantity for each product is 30 per year for price evaluation purposes.

2) The Tab labeled “Paper Products”: The Unit of Measure for each product in this tab is “Case”, the total evaluated price for this Tab is in cell N14, the quantity for each product is 30 per year for price evaluation purposes regardless of what quantity the offeror indicates for the “Quantity in Each Case” column. The offeror shall indicate how much product is in case in the “Quantity in Each Case” column.

3) The Tab labeled “Bags”: The Unit of Measure for each product in this tab is “Case”, the total evaluated price for this Tab is in cell N11, the quantity for each product is 30 per year for price evaluation purposes regardless of what quantity the offeror indicates for the “Quantity in Each Case” column. The offeror shall indicate how much product is in case in the “Quantity in Each Case” column.

4) The Tab labeled “Applicators & Wearables”: The Unit of Measure for some products in this tab is “Case” and some are “Each”, the total evaluated price for this Tab is in cell N84, the quantity for each product is 30 per year for price evaluation purposes regardless of what quantity the offeror indicates for the “Quantity in Each Case” column. The offeror shall indicate how much product is in case in the “Quantity in Each Case” column if the Unit of Measure is “Case”.

5) The Tab labeled “Equipment”: The Unit of Measure for each product in this tab is “Each”, the total evaluated price for this Tab is in cell O49, the quantity for each product is 1 per year for price evaluation purposes.

6) The Tab labeled “VMI Services”: The offeror shall input the annual VMI fee amount for the base and all option years, the total evaluated price for this tab is in cell I4.

7) The Tab labeled “Certification Training”: The offeror shall input the hourly rates for the items for the base and all options, the total evaluated price for this tab is in cell H49.

8) The Tab labeled “PMCS”: The offeror shall input the Preventive Maintenance Checks and Service Fee Regardless of number of machines assessed and the Mechanic's Hourly Labor Rate for the base and all options, the total evaluated price for this tab is in cell G8.

The total evaluate price for this RFP shall be the price in cell D10 of the tab labeled “IDIQ Total Evaluated Price”.

FAR 52.217-8 is pre-built into each tab’s total evaluated price by dividing the price of option year 4 by 2.

Regarding Quantity Discounts:

The Government would like quantity discounts on bulk orders, for example, if the government orders X quantity of Enzyme Cleaner Concentrate gallon in one bulk order, the Government encourages the offeror to provide a bulk order discount off of the stated IDIQ unit price.

The offeror shall identify which products have a quantity discount and indicate nature of the quantity discounts as part of their volume 2 separate from Attachment J.3.

Brand Name that the Offeror is Proposing:

The offeror shall indicate the brand name that the offeror is proposing in the tabs that have such a column and for the tab labeled “Equipment”, the offeror shall indicate the Brand/Manufacture Name that the Offeror is Proposing and the Model Number that the Offeror is proposing in their respective columns.

M.1 BASIS FOR AWARD

Evaluations will be conducted in accordance with the procedures defined below. The Government will first verify the on-time submission of all proposals. The Contracting Officer will then verify the proposals meet the Volume and Organization structure described in Section L.3. Volume I of the proposals that meet the requirements of Section L.3 will be submitted to the Source Selection Evaluation Panel (SSEP) for evaluation. Each non-price factor will be assigned an adjectival rating as established in Section M.2 herein. Once all Volume I proposals are evaluated, the SSEP will evaluate Volume II, Price in accordance with the evaluation criteria for this factor.

The Government will make an award to the offeror whose proposal represents the best value to the Government. Within the best value continuum, the Government will use the Tradeoff process of non-price and price factors in evaluating the proposals approved for evaluation. The Government will reserve the right to make an award without discussions if there is a fully acceptable proposal received in the initial submissions. If not, the Government may enter into discussions with offerors. The Government also reserves the right to make no award.

In the event that two or more proposals are determined not to have any substantial technical differences (i.e., are technically equivalent), price may become the determining factor and award may be made to the lower priced proposal. In the event that proposals are not technically equal, award may be made to other than the offeror with the lowest priced proposal, if the Government determines that a price premium is warranted due to technical merit. The Government may also award to other than the highest technically rated proposal, if the government determines that a price premium is not warranted.

Evaluations will be based on a complete assessment of the proposal submission. Proposals will be evaluated on the following factors listed in descending order of importance. All non-price factors when combined are more important than Factor 5, Price.

Non Price Factors:

Factor 1: Technical Approach Factor 2: Key Personnel Factor 3: Corporate Experience Factor 4: Past Performance

Price Factors:

Factor 5: Price

The evaluation criteria for each factor is as follows:

M.1.1 Factor 1 – Technical Approach

The Government will evaluate the offeror’s Technical Approach narrative by determining the extend to which the Technical Approach narrative describes the offeror’s key management approaches, policies, and procedures to be implemented to ensure exceptional project management, delivery and quality control to complete the contract on-time, within budget and the extent to which the narrative meets the requirements of SOW sections C.3 Scope of Work, C.5 Performance Areas, and C.6 Deliverables and Deliverables Schedule (For Each Task Order).

The Government will determine the extent to which the technical approach describes the following:

a) Ability of the offeror to provide details and information to indicate that they can manage a project of this magnitude.

b) Background of the company and number of employees and specialists is sufficient for the requirements of the SOW .

c) The offeror’s supply chain resiliency indicates that the offeror’s supply chain will not be disrupted so that the Government can received products on time.

d) The offeror’s sustainable product certification is sufficient for the SOW requirements.

e) The offeror’s training programs offered are sufficient for the SOW requirements.

f) The offeror’s VMI implementation is sufficient for the SOW requirements.

M.1.2 Factor 2 – Key Personnel

The Government will evaluate the extent to which the offeror submitted resumes of all key personnel serving the contract, inclusive of key personnel identified in Section C.15 of the SOW, meet the requirements of the SOW.

M.1.3 Factor 3 – Corporate Experience

Corporate Experience will be evaluated to determine the extent to which the offeror’s Corporate Experience reflects past experience on contracts of similar size and scope to this requirement. An offeror that submits Corporate Experience which is not within five calendar years of the proposal due date will be rated unacceptable for this factor, and therefore not eligible for award. A higher degree of relevancy of the corporate experience will result in a higher score for this evaluation factor. The more the Corporate Experience demonstrates similarity to the SOW, the more relevant the Corporate Experience will be found in determining the rating for this evaluation factor.

M.1.4 Factor 4 – Past Performance

Past performance will be evaluated to determine the extent to which the offeror’s past performance demonstrates successful performance on the contracts identified under the corporate experience evaluation factor.

The Government will evaluate the Past Performance Questionnaires received from customer references to determine the extent to which the offeror has demonstrated at least a satisfactory record of customer satisfaction. The Government may contact these references or use other references/information to verify past performance, such as CPARS. See Attachment J.5 – Past Performance Questionnaire for the contents that the Government will evaluate from the offeror’s past customers when using the Past Performance Questionnaire to evaluate past performance. Offerors without a record of relevant past performance, or for whom information on past performance is not available, shall not be evaluated favorably or unfavorably, but shall instead receive an overall rating of “neutral.”

M.1.5 Factor 5 – Price

The Government will evaluate the price proposals of all offerors receiving an Acceptable rating or above for Factors 1, 2, and 3. Price criterion will measure not only actual dollars but reasonableness of the offeror’s proposed price and its position in the range of all offeror prices.

The offeror’s price proposal shall be evaluated for price reasonableness to prevent the Government from paying too much for the services outlined in the SOW. Additionally, a price realism analysis may be performed to determine whether an offeror’s price is unrealistically low. An unrealistically low proposal may question whether an offeror fully understands the size, magnitude, complexity, and scope of service outlined in the SOW. An unrealistic price proposal may serve as a rejection for the proposal.

The offeror’s proposal will be evaluated for unbalanced pricing utilizing price analysis techniques. The Government may determine that a proposal is unacceptable if the prices proposed are materially unbalanced. A proposal may be rejected if the Contracting Officer determines that the lack of balance poses an unacceptable risk to the Government.

Price will not be rated adjectivally, but will be evaluated based on a comprehensive review.

Price proposals shall be evaluated with respect to accuracy and completeness based on information submitted in the offeror’s written submission. This process will involve verification that figures are correctly calculated, prices are presented in the requested format, and that proposed rates and any applicable discounts are accurate. Additionally, the Government may utilize one or more of the following methods to evaluate price:

• Comparison to other proposals received;

• Comparison and/or analysis based on Independent Government Cost Estimate; or

• Comparison/analysis to historical prices.

As part of the price evaluation, the Government will evaluate the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) clause 52.217-9, Option to Extend the Term of the Contract and FAR 52.217-8, Option to Extend Services. The offeror's total evaluated price shall include the base period and all option periods. FAR 52.217-8 will be evaluated by dividing the price of option period 4 by two and including that amount in the evaluated price.

The Government will take into consideration the individual tab’s total evaluated price within Attachment J.3, i.e., the Cleaning Products Total Evaluated Price, the Paper Products Total Evaluated Price, etc. as well as the Total Evaluated Price within the IDIQ Total Evaluated Price tab.

During the trade-off analysis, the Government may take into consideration the quantity discounts on bulk orders, however, the Government will not apply any quantity discounts on bulk orders to the total evaluated price of the IDIQ.

M.2 RATING AND DEFINITIONS

The Government will evaluate non-price factors 1, 2, and 3 of Volume I using the following adjectival ratings and definitions scale:

Rating Description

Outstanding The proposal provides a very clear, comprehensive and detailed response which exceeds all requirements and includes significant strengths and strengths with no weaknesses, significant weaknesses, or deficiencies. The risk of unsuccessful performance is very low as the proposal demonstrates a clear understanding of the requirements and can be expected to result in outstanding performance.

Good The proposal provides a sound response which meets all requirements and includes significant strengths and strengths with few weaknesses, no significant weaknesses, and no deficiencies. The risk of unsuccessful performance is low as the proposal demonstrates an understanding of the requirements and can be expected to result in satisfactory performance.

Acceptable The proposal provides a response which is capable of meeting all requirements and may include both strengths (may include some significant strengths) and weaknesses with no significant weaknesses or deficiencies where the strengths outweigh the weaknesses or weaknesses do not outweigh the capability to meet the requirement. The risk of unsuccessful performance is moderate as the proposal demonstrates a general understanding of the requirements and can be expected to result in satisfactory performance.

Marginal The proposal provides a response which does not meet all requirements and includes strengths, weaknesses, significant weaknesses and/or deficiencies where the strengths are outweighed by the weaknesses and/or deficiencies. The risk of unsuccessful performance is high as the proposal does not demonstrate an understanding of requirements and can be expected to result in unsatisfactory performance.

Unacceptable The proposal provides a response that does not meet all requirements and includes significant weaknesses and/or deficiencies which far outweigh any strengths noted. The risk of unsuccessful performance is very high as the proposal does not demonstrate an understanding of the requirements and will result in unsatisfactory performance.

During the course of the evaluation, the Source Selection Evaluation Panel will record proposal Significant Strengths, Strengths, Weaknesses, Significant Weaknesses, and Deficiencies. The definitions of these terms are as follows:

Significant Strengths: A strength that appreciably enhances the merit of a proposal or appreciably increases the probability of successful contract performance.

Strengths: Any aspect of a proposal which exceeds a requirement and increases the probability of successful performance of the contract.

Weaknesses: A flaw in the proposal that increases the risk of unsuccessful contract performance.

Significant Weaknesses: A weakness that appreciably increases the risk of unsuccessful contract performance.

Deficiencies: A material failure of a proposal to meet a Government requirement or a combination of significant weaknesses in a proposal that increases the risk of unsuccessful contract performance to an unacceptable level.

Offerors who rate below Acceptable under Factors 1, 2, or 3 will not be eligible for award and their price (Factor 5) will not be evaluated.

The Government will rate factor 4, Past Performance, using the following adjectival ratings and definitions scale, NLT means “No Later than”:

Rating Description Substantial Confidence

Based on the Offeror’s recent (NLT 5 Years) and relevant performance record, the Government has a high expectation that the Offeror will successfully perform.

Satisfactory Confidence

Based on the Offeror’s recent (NLT 5 Years) and relevant performance record, the Government has a reasonable expectation that the Offeror will successfully perform.

Limited Confidence

Based on the Offeror’s recent (NLT 5 Years) and relevant performance record, the Government has a limited expectation that the Offeror will successfully perform.

No Confidence Based on the Offeror’s recent (NLT 5 Years) and relevant performance record, the Government has a no expectation that the Offeror will successfully perform.