Fixed_Income_Questions_Q A_6_(2-24-15).pdf

Questions - #6

H.3 PBGC-03-003: as a UK investment manager we will be primarily providing all services under this agreement from the United Kingdom as well as client servicing from

US based employees in our US offices. Therefore we would appreciate discussing the relevance of this clause in such a context. All employees would work on the contract to the extent relevant as part of servicing the Government and fulfilling obligations under the contract so we would not allocate individuals to the account specifically which PBGC could approve.

Answer: PBGC is willing to discuss the relevance of this clause to this contract. The agency will consider modifying aspects of this clause to accommodate vendors operating overseas.

Section H – Special Contract Clauses – H.3 PBGC -03-003 Suitability Determination

Requirements (Jan 2012) – Paragraph 1 (pp. 47-48):

a. The section referenced immediately above provides that the “PBGC reserves the right to refuse any foreign national participation on this contract . . . .” Is the

PBGC able to contract with an offeror that has a global employee base and would therefore find it difficult to grant the PBGC the unilateral right to determine that a foreign national may not participate on the contract (unless the foreign national has been excluded for good cause)?

Answer: PBGC may be willing to modify this aspect of the Suitability clause to engage with a firm that employs individuals overseas.

b. The section referenced immediately above provides that “. . . Contracting

Officer’s Representative (COR) will provide the appropriate background investigation forms to the contractor and give the contractor instructions for completing the background investigation process.” While our firm conducts a thorough background check upon each employee’s hiring, we prefer to not subject our employees to additional background checks mandated by external parties.

Would the PBGC be able to enter into a contract with an offeror that uses its own background investigation forms and complies with its own background investigation procedures?

Answer: PBGC is willing to enter into a contract with a firm that conducts its own background investigations. The agency will consider modifying this clause to reflect this change. The contractor may be asked to detail and document its background investigation processes so PBGC can ensure that the contractor’s process is sufficiently compliant with a federal Government background investigation.