scope-event-mgmt-software_5.14.26_IT.docx

EVENT MANAGEMENT SOFTWARE

Purpose: The purpose of this RFP is to receive proposals from qualified contractors for services for event management software for the Okaloosa County Tourism Department. The County owns and operates several venues of varying sizes and operational complexity:

Destin-Fort Walton Beach Convention Center provides 32,000 square feet of multi-use indoor space, including a 21,200-square-foot grand ballroom plus additional meeting rooms ranging from 425 to 1575 square feet. There is also 30,000 square feet of functional outdoor space along with several terraces. Food and beverage services are provided via an exclusive catering contractor.

The Rigdon Center offers nearly 50,000 square feet of flexible event space across indoor and outdoor venues, making it a go-to location for a wide variety of gatherings from large-scale festivals and consumer expos to sporting tournaments, trade shows, and, of course, the annual fair.

Baker Recreation & Equestrian Center spans 50 acres with two arenas, 150+ horse stalls, RV hookups, and concession area, perfect for rodeos, barrel races, and dog shows.

The Northend encompasses 40 acres of open green fields, woods, and a beautiful lake view, showcasing an enclosed barn that can accommodate up to 200 guests, an open-pole barn, and two cabins to host weddings, reunions, celebrations, and community events with ease.

Two additional properties are coming online soon: Shoal River Preserve and Highway 98 Venue.

Background: The County is looking to improve operations through the use of an event management system that will significantly lower the total cost of operation, and provide management with a clear and precise software system. The contractor shall be qualified and experienced in the industry and propose best practices currently used. The goal of this project is to provide a solution that will create an efficient and configurable workflow and allow management to manage operations and create meaningful and accurate reports. Ten (10) years of event data will be migrated to the new system.

Proposals are being requested for services as described and specified within this document. Any omissions from these specifications and supplemental specifications of any details or descriptions concerning any point, product, or service shall be regarded as meaning that only the best commercial practices are to prevail, and only services of the highest standards are required. Interpretations of these specifications shall be made upon the basis of the preceding statement during award consideration.

The County is dedicated to incorporating the best available, most effective, and efficient practices necessary to achieve the optimum use of resources. Notwithstanding the requirements and expectations for the systems and services included in this RFP, the County is interested in reviewing progressive ideas. Therefore, respondents are encouraged to suggest alternatives, which will be given full consideration by the County. The respondent must fully document all costs and thoroughly explain the anticipated benefits of the suggested alternatives to the County in their RFP response. The County shall consider hosted solutions that are owned and operated by a service provider but will not consider proposals for outsourcing.

Scope of Services: Responses to this RFP must include a thorough description of all functions, installation of all components, training for all components, technical support and future upgrades, as well as appropriate deployment assistance to ensure the system is properly implemented. The software must support the full lifecycle of event and client management, including sales, booking, contract administration, event execution, financial tracking, and reporting.

The contractor shall install a complete and functional system including hardware, software, network installation, all necessary cabling, all data conversion from the existing computerized system, and all future updates to the system. Provide all required technical support for customization of received validations, management reports, file formats, and conversion of existing data saved on the current system. The vendor must develop a reliable check method to ensure that all data from these export files is passed to the new system. A minimum of four (4) weeks of testing shall be conducted by the County’s representative before final acceptance.

Database Architecture

· Describe the system architecture.

· Please describe the overall scalability of the solution.

· How does the system archive historical data? What utilities are in place to prevent historical data from being changed?

· Does the system have data volume limitations?

· Is the system's run-time performance affected by the volume of data?

· Indicate what database vendors are supported by the proposed system, and what methods are employed to access/connect to these data sources.

· Describe how the application is scalable in terms of growth in the number of users, amount of data, performance, and number of transactions.

· Indicate the maximum through-put of transactions the system can handle per hour and per day.

· Can mobile devices be utilized to access the system? Explain. If yes, please provide a listing of supported mobile operating systems.

System Requirements

· Please provide details of whether the system is hosted or SaaS.

· Please include the data center specifications and which third parties, if any, are involved in the hosting of the application.

· Please provide the minimum hardware requirements for end-user workstations.

· Please provide any requisite software which must be installed on end user workstations in support of your proposed solution.

· Is the system accessed via hyperlink or application icon?

· Integrate seamlessly with Workday (County’s financial system), DocuSign (client contracts), and BluePay (payment processing) Application Security

· Methods for identification and authentication.

· User access to data.

· Audit trails.

· Define the security architecture of the application and system?

· Describe the process to identify and address system vulnerabilities.

· Concerning hardware and software security, define the process for identifying and addressing such vulnerabilities.

· Define what network services will be utilized by the solution. How will access be controlled?

· What network protocols will be used?

· Provide samples and process maps of the transmission file format, definitions and procedures.

· Provide specific examples of previous projects in which you successfully supported customers who had a high level of potential liability for the protection of highly sensitive data

· Provide most recent SOC 2 Type II report

· Provide PCI-DSS Attestation of Compliance (AoC)

· Affirm all primary and backup data will reside in CONUS (Contiguous US)

· Define RTO (Recovery Time) and RPO (Recovery Point) targets

· Provide Breach Notification within 48 hours of discovery

· Provide Certified Data Destruction at end of contract term User Accounts and Authentication

· Define the process to support identification and authentication.

· Does the solution allow for single sign-on (SSO)?

· Define how the solution assigns user accounts. Does the system allow for shared accounts?

· Expiration of user accounts after a defined period of inactivity.

· Please provide a detailed explanation of the licensing model and explain any differences in pricing of users (e.g., a user who needs read only access vs. a user who creates and modifies data).

· Please provide an explanation of incremental growth is accommodated (e.g. additional users at some point in the future).

Access Control

· Does the solution support different user roles?

· Does the solution log-off a user after a predefined period of inactivity? Is this a system-wide, user group, or user parameter?

· Define who creates/assigns user roles/profiles, and how are they maintained. How are user types (profiles) created and managed?

· Does the solution support multiple user roles (i.e., user, external user, supervisor, and training)? Describe any system limitations.

· Define how the system will handle varied access and approval levels.

· Describe how the system reacts to several users accessing the same record at the same time.

· Support role-based access with minimal training overhead.Ability to set user permissions for creating, editing, approving, and sending documents

· Ability to control who can create, edit, and approve pricing changes

· Ability to schedule future pricing changes (effective dates)

· Ability for authorized staff (non-technical users) to modify templates without assistance

· Support for venue-specific templates Auditing Capabilities

· Describe the systems audit capabilities for all modules and data records. What level of audit information is provided?

· Describe the solution's capability to enact additional auditing for especially sensitive files and transactions.

· Does the system allow for customized audit rules that can be defined by the system administrator?

· What is the process for viewing audit logs?

· Can audit logs be downloaded? What file types/formats are available?

· Does the solution archive historical audit log data?

· Are audit logs encrypted or masked to protect sensitive data?

· Please describe how the system tracks changes as part of the audit process.

· What methods are used to monitor customer sessions? What metrics are tracked?

· Describe how the solution monitors system usage.

· Does the solution include time stamp and user ID as part of the audit log information?

· How does the system track session times and actions?

· Enable easy access to historical and current event data

· Improve forecasting capabilities (revenue, attendance, utilization)

· Support billing, invoicing, and revenue tracking tied to events

· Ability to create and manage multiple price lists, including: venue rental rates (hourly, daily, multi-day), equipment, package and bundle pricing.

· Ability to adjust pricing.

· Ability to create and maintain a centralized inventory

· Ability to prevent overbooking of equipment and resources

· Ability to update inventory status based on work order completion System Administration

· Does the solution provide a separate administration function to perform the following administrative security maintenance? Access control maintenance (add/modify/delete user permissions). Monitor/maintain audit log.

· Does the system provide security to prevent non- administrators from completing administration tasks?

· Does the solution require client software to accomplish administration tasks?

· Does the system provide a single level of administrative control, or does it allow for separation of duties? Please describe.

· Describe the system's search capabilities to find users or accounts. What are the key search criteria elements supported?

· Does the system audit changes to user privileges? Please explain.

· Ability to store electronic documents (e.g., emails, client RFPs, Word documents, Excel spreadsheets) as a permanent part of the client/event record.

· Support for branding elements including logos, formatting, and standardized language Data Integrity

· Describe how the solution identifies and logs data change for audit purposes.

· Define the solutions change control process. Explain the process for testing patches and new releases of applications.

· Ensure data accuracy and auditability across financial transactions Sales and Marketing

· Ability to create, track, and maintain client database.

· Ability to search client events using a variety of different criteria.

· Ability to project potential event revenue and create a pipeline of potential events.

· Ability to enter call notes and set up follow-up reminders.

· Ability to create and track sales goals per salesperson.

· Ability to generate sales reports on goal vs. actual.

· The system must support multi-venue coordination, shared resources, and centralized reporting.

· Multi-venue calendar option or comparable solution

· Provide accurate, real-time reporting and dashboards Contract Administration

· Ability to create and modify contracts based on locations booked and event-specific rate schedule.

· Ability to track status of all outstanding contracts based on a facility-defined contract status.

· Ability to send contracts to clients via email.

· Ability to create, modify, and send addendums to clients via email.

· Ability to create event-specific payment plans and auto-generate an invoice in accounts receivable when payment dates become due.

· Ability to create, edit, and manage multiple document templates for: Proposals, contracts, addendums, invoices and payment schedules

· Ability to automatically populate templates with system data, including client information, event details (event it, dates, locations, spaces reserved), pricing, fees, and rate schedules, equipment and service selections

· Ability to conditionally display content based on venue or location

· Ability to generate and deliver documents electronically via email or client portal

· Integration with electronic signature platforms (e.g., DocuSign or equivalent)

· Integration with Microsoft Word and Excel

· Ability to track when documents are viewed, signed, and returned Event Scheduling

· Ability to create and maintain a database of master locations.

· Ability to create and maintain multiple rental rate schedules.

· Ability to create and maintain multiple rate schedules for various authority locations.

· Ability to book new events and re-book events from existing events.

· Ability to assign a booking commitment level to each event.

· Ability to search for the best fit for an event by date, days of the week, square footage, etc.

· Ability to record a variety of event-related statistics.

· Ability to generate a report detailing which locations are in use by date range.

Event Management

· Ability to assign events to event services staff and keep a master calendar of assignments.

· Ability to generate event outlines which detail event-specific location activity for a given date and time and detail department-specific instructions.

· Ability to generate reports detailing department instructions for a given time period, location schedule, special notes.

· Ability to generate a two-week schedule of any and all event-related activity for specific locations.

· Ability to generate an event-specific report detailing the activity within each location for each date/time entry in the event outline.

· Ability to create and store narratives of event history for future use.

· Ability to create and maintain an equipment master for items used by event organizers.

· Ability to create and maintain multiple equipment rate schedules.

· Ability to create an event settlement document detailing all event-related client charges (e.g., rent, utility charges, equipment rental charges).Ability to scale diagrams accurately based on square footage and dimensions

· Ability to create, upload, and manage floor plans for all venues, including: indoor spaces (ballrooms, meeting rooms), outdoor spaces (fields, open areas, barns, arenas)

· Ability to define and label zones, sections, booths, and subspaces within a venue

· Drag-and-drop interface to place items on room diagram: tables, chairs, staging, booths, equipment and temporary structures (tents, fencing, etc.)

Exhibitor Orders

· Ability to create an equipment master for equipment and services offered to exhibitors.

· Ability to assign equipment/service to a specific department and financial category (categories will determine debit and credit accounts, applicable taxes, etc.).

· Ability to maintain exhibitor information, collect, and process all order and payment information for each exhibitor.

· Ability to produce daily reports of a list of all exhibitor payments and services ordered.

· Ability to produce a list of all exhibitor payments that are still in reserve account.

· Ability to produce a summary view of an exhibitor including, but not limited to, booth information, payment information, and work order completion information.

· Ability to generate and email an exhibitor invoice.

· Ability to process all exhibitor information and seamlessly pass the data to the accounting system.

· Ability to process exhibitor orders and payments online.

· Integrate seamlessly with the County’s merchant services (BluePay) Work Orders

· Ability to create and issue work orders for tasks to be accomplished and track them for timely completion, assign labor, and maintain their schedules.

· Ability to view and maintain existing work orders.

· Ability to print the work order for any work order or group of work orders to issue them.

· Ability to track all equipment inventory items for a facility and view all use activity for a particular item.

· Ability to track all consumable inventory items for a facility and generate inventory replenishment reports.

· Ability to generate and set up recurring automatic work order templates for preventive maintenance.

· Ability to schedule automatic work order into real work orders and reset for future run.

· Ability to generate dashboard information on all work orders at a given point of time which can be used for future projections.

· Able to define forms and data files that will be used within operations.

· Have an internal operations administration feature to set parameters, access within operations.

· Ability to review and maintain all equipment and services currently assigned to that location and make necessary updates as required.

Accounting

· Ability to define, maintain, and list the accounting funds, years, and chart of accounts for the unique set of financial data but share a common set of locations and calendars.

· Ability to define structure and characteristics of the accounts to be used.

· Ability to generate different accounting reports like ledger reports, accounts monthly totals, over/under reports, balance sheets, etc.

· Ability to create ledger entries into the accounting system by defining data input formats.

· Ability to create and track fiscal year budgets.

· Ability to perform accounts receivable functions to track invoices that have been sent to clients, exhibitors that owe money, statements, aging reports, etc.

· Ability to import/export or share data with the Workday, the County’s financial management system.

Reporting

· Reports to identify and display events and/or calendar data in various formats.

· Ability to generate a chart or spreadsheet of all booked locations over a particular period of time.

· Ability to generate a location availability report.

· Food and beverage report may be generated to identify all food and beverage needs/functions that are being utilized within a specified date range.

· Event status change reports may be generated to produce a list of events within a specified period of time that are published and have had an event schedule or department instruction change in the last 24 hours.

· Reports to identify and display events and/or calendar data in various formats.

· Event bulletin report may be generated to view the overall scope of events selected for a given time period.

· Event schedule report may be generated to provide an overall view of the parameters of upcoming events. Also the booking status information may be retrieved.

· Event attendance report may be generated to get a quick view of the number of people to expect for the events selected.

· Calendar of events may be a comprehensive report to be generated to get a dashboard view of the booked rooms and event times on any given actual event day.

· Event services schedule may be a report to generate listing of all staff assigned for upcoming events.

Implementation

· Has your organization implemented the proposed solution in a multi-facility environment? If yes, please explain.

· Has your organization migrated data from other venue management software applications? If yes, please provide the name of the application, an explanation of the process and references from the venues where this migration occurred.

· Please provide a high-level project plan for implementation. Please describe the roles and responsibilities during the implementation process.

· Please provide an estimate of the time required to implement, from good requirements to running in production. Feel free to qualify time estimates.

· Please provide an overview of the training provided during the implementation phase. How many hours will be provided? Will the training be conducted onsite or remotely?

· Please elaborate on the number of full time employees required to administer and maintain your proposed solution.

· Describe what training materials are utilized and what documentation is provided with the system. Provide a minimum of five (5) days of onsite training after system installation. The County will schedule the training days and hours. The contractor shall provide training as needed.

Customer Support and Upgrades

· Describe in detail the service level for support. In-system user guides? Helpdesk online or via phone? Annual user conference?

· What is the average response time for technical and end-user support questions?

· What is the average resolution time for technical and end-user issues?

· What hours are the support personnel available? Are they available 24/7/365?

· How many members make up the support team?

· What is the average number of years of experience for current personnel providing technical and end-user support for the proposed application?

· What processes are in place to monitor response time during peak usage? How are response issues resolved?

· Include a clear and precise description of support/maintenance after the warranty or system acceptance period. Please include practices for upgrades, minor or major, during the next five (5) years. Please address all software components (application and third party) with respect to support and upgrades.

Development

· Please describe the process for enhancements to the system. Can customers influence product direction?

· Please describe your development methodology. State what software life cycle methodology(s) are used in product development.

· Please explain your process for change management.

· Please describe the process for the testing and implementation of new releases and a history of application modifications.

· Describe the long range vision for the product.

· Please provide a high level roadmap for future development, new features, and application revisions for the next 24 months.

Proposal Format Proposals shall be submitted in the following format and include the following information.

1. Cover letter stating the proposing firm’s qualifications and experiences to perform this work, as well as education and experience of staff to be assigned to county’s account. Also provide a current list of all clients.

2. Detailed responses to scope of services: database architecture, system requirements, application security, user accounts and authentication, access control, auditing capabilities, system administration, data integrity, sales and marketing, contract administration, event scheduling, event management, exhibitor orders, work orders, accounting, reporting, implementation, customer support and upgrades, and development.

3. Itemized costs for software, installation, training, maintenance, support, upgrades and recurring service as outlined in the Pricing Proposal format provided herein.

4. References from current clients worked within the past two (2) years of similar size and magnitude for the same type of service proposed. References shall include a contact person and phone number.

Basis of Award: Proposals will be evaluated according to the following criteria and weight:

Proposer’s qualifications and experience (25 points) Completeness of Proposed Solution (50 points) Fees (20 points) References (5 points) Proposals shall be evaluated by a selection committee. The selection committee may, at its option, request any or all proposers to provide on-site demonstrations of the proposed system at the expense of the proposer.

Contract Term: The contract term is anticipated to be five years.

Schedule: This tentative schedule may be altered at any time at the discretion of the County.

Pricing Proposal Event Management System

Annual Maintenance/Support

Please explain your one-time and recurring fees, how they are calculated, and what is included.

Although the contract term is anticipated to be five years, the County requests pricing remain unchanged for the first three years, and then be the same for the next two years for budgeting purposes.