RFQ Letter - Education and Training PM Columbus AFB.docx

DEFENSE HEALTH AGENCY

SOUTHERN MARKETS CONTRACTING DIVISION

7800 IH-10 West, Suite 235

SAN ANTONIO, TX 78230

4 August 2022 Solicitation # HT9408-22-Q-0008

Page | 5

MEMORANDUM FOR Small Business Contractors

FROM: Caitlin E. Hippensteel Contracting Officer

SUBJECT: Request for Quote HT9408-22-Q-0008 – One (1) FTE Education and Training Program Manager at Columbus AFB, MS

*NOTICE TO OFFEROR(S)/SUPPLIER(S): Funds are not presently available for this effort. No award will be made under this RFQ until funds are available. The Government reserves the right to cancel this RFQ, either before or after the closing date for receipt of quotes. In the event the Government cancels this RFQ, the Government has no obligation to reimburse an Offeror for any costs.

*This is a follow-on requirement. Previous contract was FA3022-21-P-0018 awarded to NFG Consulting, Inc. There is no current incumbent in this position.

The Government anticipates awarding a competitive Firm-Fixed-Price (FFP) contract. The NAICS is 541611 (size standard $21.5M). This RFQ is being issued in accordance with (IAW) FAR 13.5 and is a total small business set aside.

RFQ Attachments:

1. Attachment 1 PWS

2. Attachment 2 Price Sheet

3. Attachment 3 Project Summary Sheet

4. Attachment 4 Past Performance Questionnaire

5. Attachment 5 Clauses and Provisions

6. Attachment 6 Notification of Compliance with Insurance Requirements

7. Attachment 7 Personally Identifiable Information, Protected Health Information, and Federal Information Requirements

ADDENDUM TO FAR 52.212-1, Instructions to Offerors – Commercial Products and Commercial Services

An official quote is hereby requested for one (1) full-time equivalent (FTE) at the following locations:

Program Manager

Information in terms of the work schedule, duty hours, overage hours (if applicable), on-call hours (if applicable) and any MTF-unique requirements are provided in the PWS at Attachment # 1 to this RFQ.

The Government will award a contract resulting from this RFQ to the responsible Offeror whose quote conforms to the RFQ and is the most advantageous (Best Value) to the Government, price and other factors considered. Factors being utilized to evaluate quotes are:

Factor 1 – Technical Factor 2 – Past Performance Factor 3 – Price

The Government contemplates this requirement to include a one-year base period with four (4) one-year option periods. Should your organization be selected for this contract, you will be issued a unique contract number specific to our contracting office at time of award. Payment will be required through electronic invoices through Wide Area Workflow (WAWF) in accordance (IAW) DFARS 252.232-7003.

QUOTE PREPARATION INSTRUCTIONS: Provide one (1) electronic quote copy. The quote shall be submitted in four sections: Administrative, Technical, Past Performance and Price. Quote shall be submitted via e-mail to the Contracting Officer and Contracting Specialist for this RFQ at caitlin.e.hippensteel.civ@mail.mil (also copy caitlin.e.hippensteel.civ@health.mil) and thomas.l.steinman.civ@mail.mil (also copy thomas.l.steinman.civ@health.mil) NLT Thursday, 25 August 2022 at 2:00pm CDT (1:00pm EDT).

Please note DHA is undergoing a migration of all e-mail addresses to health.mil. Please use both email addresses for each POC above to ensure that all correspondence is received.

All quotes submitted after the deadline reflected in this RFQ will be considered untimely and ineligible for award.

The quote shall be clear, concise, and include sufficient detail for effective evaluation. Responses to this RFQ shall strictly adhere to the requirements set forth in the RFQ. Submissions that do not adhere to format and content requirements may be considered non-compliant. The Government reserves the right to eliminate any such quotes from consideration for award. The quote shall not contain any extraneous information such as advertisements, or marketing information.

SECTION I – ADMINISTRATIVE: Within the Administrative section, Offerors shall ensure that the quote reflects Offeror’s name, address, and telephone number, CAGE code, and UEI number; the full address, and phone number of the Offeror; points of contact (POCs) authorized to negotiate with the Government on the Offeror’s behalf; the RFQ number; a statement confirming the Offeror is willing to hold its prices firm for at least 90 days from the date specified for receipt of offers.

Offerors shall be registered in the System for Award Management (SAM) with the appropriate NAICS Code (541611) and shall not have any Active Exclusions listed within SAM. If the Offeror is currently registered in SAM with completed representations and certifications (most recent version), an affirmation on the title page (or second page) that these representations and certificates are current, complete, and accurate as of the date quotes are due shall suffice. Otherwise, the Offeror shall provide one (1) completed copy of FAR Provision 52.212-3, Offeror Representations and Certifications, Alternate I and any other provisions herein that require Offeror completion located within this RFQ.

Insurance will be required in accordance with FAR 52.228-5 – Insurance – Work on a Government Installation. Notification of Compliance with Contract Insurance Requirements (Attachment # 6) or Certificate of Insurance shall be provided in this section.

Contractors shall submit questions pertaining to the RFQ package to the Ordering Activity (OA) by the deadline reflected in this RFQ. Questions shall be submitted via email to caitlin.e.hippensteel.civ@mail.mil (also copy caitlin.e.hippensteel.civ@health.mil) and thomas.l.steinman.civ@mail.mil (also copy thomas.l.steinman.civ@health.mil) by 2:00 PM CST on 11 August 2022. No questions will be entertained after this date. In the event issues pertaining to a RFQ package cannot be resolved to the satisfaction of the contracting officer, the Contracting Officer reserves the right to withdraw or cancel the RFQ requirement at no additional cost to the Government.

To facilitate the award process, all Offerors must include a statement regarding the terms and conditions herein as follows:

"The terms and conditions in the solicitation are acceptable to be included in the award document without modification, deletion, or addition."

OR

"The terms and conditions in the solicitation are acceptable to be included in the award document with the exception, deletion, or addition of the following:"

Offeror shall list exception(s) and rationale for the exception(s).

SECTION II – FACTOR 1 – TECHNICAL:

The Technical Quote shall be addressed in sufficient written detail for the Government to determine if the Offeror understands the aspect of the Governments requirement. The Technical Quote shall provide sufficient detail for the Government to determine whether the quote acceptably meets the requirements of the RFQ. Statements that the Offeror understands, can or will comply with specifications, or statements paraphrasing the specification of parts thereof, of phrases such as “Standard procedures will be used” or “Well known techniques will be used” will be considered unacceptable. The Technical Quote shall provide a narrative and supporting data for the items below.

Recruitment and Retention: Describe your company’s recruitment and retention plan, the methods you will use to recruit qualified and competent personnel to ensure services commence on the date set forth in the RFQ and throughout the life of the contract. Discuss the location (Columbus, MS) to include challenges, trends, and strategies necessary to provide the services required by the Performance Work Statement. Describe your process for initial verification of certification, education, life support training, and your process for ensuring they are kept current. Describe the procedures to be used by management to maintain contact with employees to ensure all services required are being performed satisfactorily.

The Technical section is limited to five (5) pages. Pages in excess of the limitations will be removed and disregarded during the evaluation. When both sides of a sheet display printed material, it shall be counted as two pages.

SECTION III – FACTOR 2 – PAST PERFORMANCE:

The Government will review the past performance information submitted, the Contractor Performance Assessment Reporting System, and other sources available to the Government, to evaluate past performance.

A Project Summary Sheet (Attachment # 3) shall be submitted for each reference that is sent the Past Performance Questionnaire (Attachment # 4). Up to three (3) Project Summary Sheets may be submitted, with the accompanying PPQs to be submitted directly by the reference to caitlin.e.hippensteel.civ@mail.mil (also copy caitlin.e.hippensteel.civ@health.mil) and thomas.l.steinman.civ@mail.mil (also copy thomas.l.steinman.civ@health.mil). PPQs submitted by the Offeror will not be accepted.

NOTE: Past Performance Questionnaires completed for the Offeror in response to other requirements may be submitted, but they must be submitted directly by the reference to the email addresses listed immediately above.

SECTION IV – FACTOR 3 – PRICE:

The Offeror shall submit proposed pricing for all contract line item numbers identified in the RFQ using the provided Excel Price Sheet, RFQ Attachment # 2. Certified Cost or Pricing Data is not required for commercial services; but, if only one quote is received, Other than Certified Cost or Pricing data may be required.

END OF ADDENDUM TO FAR 52.212-1

ADDENDUM TO FAR 52.212-2, Evaluation—Commercial Products and Commercial Services

(a) The Government will award a contract resulting from this solicitation to the responsible Offeror whose offer conforming to the solicitation will be most advantageous to the Government, price and other factors considered. The Government will review quotes received to determine if they are responsive to the RFQ requirements. A responsive quote is one that meets all of the terms, conditions, and specifications in the RFQ. The Offeror must provide all documents listed and comply with all RFQ instructions in order for their quote to be considered “responsive”. Only responsive quotes will be evaluated for award.

Basis of Award: Award shall be made on a “Past Performance Price Tradeoff” basis to the Offeror that provides the best value to the Government. Award will be made to the Offeror that submits an offer that is deemed most advantageous to the Government whose Technical has been determined to be “Acceptable” and trading off Past Performance against Price.

Past Performance is more important than Price. The contract will be awarded to the Offeror whose quote, based upon the evaluation criteria, represents the best value to the Government. This may result in an award to other than the lowest-priced offer if the Government determines that the better Factor 2 rating of a higher-priced offer outweighs the price difference between that Offeror and a lower-priced Offeror. However, depending on the price difference, a lower-priced offer may still represent the best value to the Government. The selection process is subjective by nature and professional judgment is implicit throughout the tradeoff process.

Award may be made without discussions with Offerors (except communications conducted for the purpose of minor clarification). Therefore, each initial offer should contain the Offeror's best terms from a technical, past performance, and price standpoint. However, the Government reserves the right to conduct discussions if it is later determined by the Contracting Officer to be necessary.

EVALUATION CRITERIA

The following evaluation factors will be used to evaluate each quote.

Factor 1 – Technical Factor 2 – Past Performance Factor 3 – Price

Factor 1 – Technical Evaluation Process:

A. The Government will evaluate all quotes for technical acceptability. The Technical factor will be evaluated and assigned an "acceptable" or "unacceptable" rating as described below. Any quote evaluated as "unacceptable" will render the entire quote "unacceptable" and ineligible for award.

B. Ratings of an Offeror’s quote reflect the Governments confidence in each Offeror’s ability, as demonstrated in its quote, to perform the requirements stated in the Performance of Work Statement. If an Offeror merely rephrases or restates the PWS, they will receive an “Unacceptable” rating for the Technical factor.

C. Recruitment and Retention: Offerors will be evaluated to ensure the elements of the proposed recruitment and retention is sufficient to attract and retain qualified personnel. The Technical Factor is met when the Offeror demonstrates:

1. A comprehensive management approach for supplying qualified personnel in accordance with the PWS on the date set forth in the RFQ and throughout the life of the contract. The approach should discuss the location (Columbus, MS) to include challenges, trends, and strategies and procedures to be used by management to maintain contact with employees to ensure all services required are being performed satisfactorily.

2. A thorough understanding (proven process) of the process for recruiting qualified personnel to fill hard-to-fill vacancies, and procedures/techniques to retain qualified personnel.

3. A comprehensive training and education approach to maintain current certification and training for contractor personnel and validate where required

D. The following ratings (Table 1) for the Technical factor will be used:

Description

Factor 2 – Past Performance Evaluation Process:

A. The Government will place all offers that received an “Acceptable” rating in Factor 1 in sequential order, from lowest total price to highest total price (base and all options), for the purposes of evaluating Factor 2. The three (3) lowest-priced offers will be evaluated as described below. If there are fewer than three (3) offers remaining in contention after the conclusion of Factor 1 evaluation, then all quotes that remain in contention will be evaluated under Factor 2.

If none of the three (3) lowest priced Offerors are judged to have a “Substantial Confidence” performance assessment rating, the next lowest priced Offeror that received an “Acceptable” rating on Factor 1 will be evaluated. The process will continue (one evaluation at a time, in order by price) until an Offeror is determined to have a “Substantial Confidence” performance assessment rating, OR until all Offerors with an “Acceptable” rating on Factor 1 are evaluated.

B. The Government reserves the right to award a contract to an Offeror who receives a performance confidence assessment of other than “Substantial Confidence.” In that event, the Source Selection Authority (Contracting Officer) shall make an integrated assessment best value award decision.

C. The Past Performance evaluation results in an integrated assessment of the Offeror’s probability of successfully performing the RFQ requirements and the assignment of an overall Performance Confidence Assessment (PCA) rating (Table 2) based on consideration of the Offeror’s recent, relevant and quality past performance from the Offeror’s submittals (PPI Sheets and PPQs) and other information (CPARS and other sources).

D. For Factor 2, Offerors must be receive a rating of “Substantial Confidence” or “Satisfactory Confidence,” or a Neutral rating, in order to be eligible for award.

Table 2. Integrated Performance Confidence Ratings

Relevancy Ratings: The Government will use the following relevancy definitions/ratings when assessing relevant past performance:

Table 3. Relevancy Ratings

Past Performance Definitions:

The following three (3) definitions will be utilized for the PCA determination:

· Recency Assessment: An assessment of the past performance information contained in the Offeror’s submittals will be made to determine if it is recent. To be recent, the effort must be ongoing or must have been performed within the past five (5) years from the date of issuance of this RFQ. For projects/contracts/task orders that are actively being performed, performance must be a minimum of 80% complete as of the date of RFQ for this contract. Any effort that is deemed “not recent” will not be evaluated further.

· Relevancy Assessment: An assessment of the recent past performance information will be made to determine its relevancy. This information will be evaluated to determine how closely the services performed under those contracts relate to the requirements of this requirement and assigned a rating (Table 3). Any effort that is deemed “not relevant” will not be evaluated for quality.

· Performance Quality Assessment: After the determination of recency and relevancy, the Government will assess the performance quality (how well the contractor performed on the contracts). The Government will review all recent and relevant past performance information collected and determine the quality of the Offeror’s performance, general trends, and usefulness of the information and incorporate these into the PCA. A separate quality assessment rating is not required; rather, the PCA rating is based on the Offeror’s overall record of recency, relevancy, and quality of performance.

Factor 3 – Price:

A. Price Analysis will be conducted on only those Offerors that receive an “Acceptable” rating on Factor 1 and any kind of a rating on Factor 2. Quotes will be evaluated for price reasonableness, balance, and completeness. A price is reasonable if, in its nature and amount, it does not exceed that which would be incurred by a prudent person in the conduct of competitive business. The Government may use various price analysis techniques and procedures to ensure a fair and reasonable price. Some of those techniques are, but not limited to, comparison of proposed prices received in response to the RFQ and/or comparison of proposed prices with the Independent Government Estimate. Price must be determined fair and reasonable in order to be eligible for award.

B. Unbalanced pricing. Offerors are cautioned against submitting an offer that contains unbalanced pricing. Unbalanced pricing may increase performance risk and could result in payment of unreasonably high prices. Unbalanced pricing exists when, despite an acceptable total evaluated price, the price of one (1) or more contract line items is significantly over or understated. The Government will analyze offers to determine whether they are unbalanced with respect to separately priced line items or sub-line items. An offer that is determined to be unbalanced may be rejected if the Contracting Officer determines that the lack of balance poses an unacceptable risk to the Government.

(b) Options. The Government will evaluate offers for award purposes by adding the total price for all options to the total price for the basic requirement. The Government may determine that an offer is unacceptable if the option prices are significantly unbalanced. Evaluation of options shall not obligate the Government to exercise the option(s).

(c) A written notice of award or acceptance of an offer, mailed or otherwise furnished to the successful Offeror within the time for acceptance specified in the offer, shall result in a binding contract without further action by either party. Before the offer’s specified expiration time, the Government may accept an offer (or part of an offer), whether or not there are negotiations after its receipt, unless a written notice of withdrawal is received before award.

(d) Given that FAR 52.217-8 provides that the Government may exercise the Option to Extend Services at the rates specified in the contract (i.e., the rates in effect when the Extension of Services option is exercised), for purposes of evaluating the Option to Extend Services, the Contracting Officer will be accomplished by using the prices offered for the last option period to determine the price for a 6-month option period, since those are the binding prices should the Option to Extend be exercised.

END OF ADDENDUM TO FAR 52.212-2

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