EAD_IDIQ_Final_v7.doc

Introduction

Department of Health and Human Services

Enterprise Human Resources Application Support ServiceS Program PeopleSoft HCM Expertise for Enterprise Human Resources and Payroll (EHRP) Application Support Services Request for Proposals: HHSP2332010EAD Contents

1A. Solicitation/Contract Form

B. Supplies or Services and Prices/Costs C. Statement of Objectives C.1 PSC Mission C.2 EAD Current Environment C.3 EAD Acquisition Goals C.4 IDIQ Vehicle Overview C.5 IDIQ Vehicle Application Support Requirements C.6 PeopleSoft HCM Area of Expertise D. Packaging and Marking E. Inspection and Acceptance E.1 Clauses Incorporated by Reference (FAR 52.252-2, February 1998) E.2 Approvals by the COTR F. Deliveries or Performance F.1 Place of Performance F.2 Period of Performance F.3 Deliverables F.4 Clauses Incorporated by Reference (FAR 52.252-2, February 1998) G. Contract Administration Data G.1 Authorities of Government Personnel G.2 Key Personnel (352.242-70, January 2006) G.3 Travel G.4 Invoice Submission G.5 Government-Furnished Property G.6 Contractor-Furnished Property G.7 Products Purchased G.8 Data to Be Delivered G.9 Staff Replacement G.10 Contracting Officer’s Technical Representative Appointment and Authority G.11 Order Limitations (FAR 52.216.19, October 1995) H. Special Contract Requirements H.1 Conflict of Interest H.2 PSC’s Use of Other Contractor Support H.3 Service Delivery Process Maturity H.4 Workload Information H.5 Electronic and Information Technology Standards H.6 Conditions of Performance H.7 HHS Information Security Program Contract Oversight Guide H.8. Information Security and Privacy Issues H.9. Access to HHS Electronic Mail H.10. Confidential Treatment of Sensitive Information H.11. Restrictions on Contractor Access to Government or Third Party Information I. Solicitation Provisions and Contract Clauses I.1 Solicitation Provisions Incorporated by Reference (FAR 52.252-1, February 1998) I.2 Evaluation—Commercial Items (FAR 52.212-2, January 1999) I.3 Offeror Representation of Commercial Items (FAR 52.212-3, August 2009) I.4 Contract Terms and Conditions required to implement Statutes or Executive Orders—Commercial Items (FAR 52.212-5, February 2010) I.5 Ordering (FAR.216.18, October 1995) I.6 Option to Extend Services (FAR 52.217-8, November 1999) I.7 Option to Extend the Term of the Task Order (FAR 52.217-9, March 2000) J. List of Attachments K. Representations, Certifications, and Other Statements of Offerors K.1 Offeror Statements K.2 Central Contractor Registration (FAR 52.204-7, April 2008) K.3 Annual Representations and Certifications (FAR 52.204-8, January 2006) K.4 Certification Regarding Environmental Tobacco Smoke L. Instructions to Offerors L.1 Written Response L.2 Objective 1 Oral Presentations M. Evaluation Factors for Award M.1 Basis for Award M.2 Factors Attachment A—EHRP Application Support Workload Information A-1 Attachment B—Price Template B-1 Attachment C—Deliverables for Task Order 1/ Objective 1 C-1 Attachment D—Capability Area and Related Experience Template D-1 Attachment E—Personnel Capability Template E-1 Attachment F—HHS Contractor Oversight Guide F-1 Attachment G—PSC Form 82 G-1

Figures

4Figure 1. Current EAD Systems Environment

Figure 2. EAD Organizational Components (Federal Personnel)

Tables Table 1. Major EAD Contractor Support Roles Table 2. Overview of Current Acquisitions Table 3. Approach to Acquiring Enterprise HR Application Support Services Table 4. Objective 1 Requirements Mapped to Contractor and PSC Roles Table 5. Mapping of Requirements to Objective 2 Table 6. Schedule for Acquiring PSC Enterprise HR Application Support Services in the PeopleSoft Area of Expertise Table 7. Page Limits for RFP Submission Table 8. Performance Management Plan Template

Request for Proposals to provide Enterprise HR Application Support Services—PeopleSoft HCM Expertise The Enterprise Applications Division (EAD)—a component of the Program Support Center (PSC) at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)—requires enterprise human resources (HR) application support services in three service capability areas: operations and maintenance (O&M), new development, and strategic analytical support. Specifically, EAD requires PeopleSoft HCM (US Federal Government version 8.9 or higher) expertise to obtain application support for its Enterprise Human Resources and Payroll (EHRP) system.

To obtain the services needed to support the EAD program, PSC is issuing this request for proposals (RFP) with the intent of awarding an indefinite-delivery, indefinite quantity (IDIQ) contract in the PeopleSoft Human Capital Management (HCM) technology area of expertise to one or more highly proficient small businesses. This acquisition is referred to as “Enterprise HR Application Support Services—PeopleSoft HCM Expertise.” The scope of work for the first task order is to transition and execute EHRP application support services.

Sections A through H of this RFP describe the schedule, including the statement of objectives (SOO) and special contract requirements, among other things. Section I addresses solicitation provisions and contract clauses, and Section J lists the attachments to the RFP. Finally, Sections K through M, respectively, discuss representations and certifications, present the instructions to offerors, and describe the evaluation factors.

A. Solicitation/Contract Form

See cover to RFP.

B. Supplies or Services and Prices/Costs

PSC is establishing an enterprise HR application support services IDIQ vehicle to address certain areas of expertise, for example, a particular technology (such as Business Objects) or HR function (such as retirement processing).

At this time, EAD is focusing on one area of expertise: PeopleSoft Human Capital Management (HCM), U.S. Federal Government version 8.9, and has identified one objective associated with this expertise area: transition and execute Enterprise Human Resources and Payroll (EHRP) application support services. It is PSC’s intent to qualify offerors in the PeopleSoft area of expertise for the IDIQ contract, to award multiple IDIQ contracts, to award the first task order, and to issue multiple subsequent task orders over time. PSC will award the initial task order for EHRP application support to vendors awarded an IDIQ contract in the PeopleSoft area of expertise as defined in this RFP.

PSC will evaluate the proposals for future task orders in accordance with the evaluation criteria stated in the task order RFPs. The government reserves the right to evaluate proposals and make awards without discussions.

In the future, PSC may add new areas of expertise to this IDIQ vehicle to support a particular technology or functional area. Firms awarded an IDIQ contract from this solicitation will be able to compete for future expertise areas if they wish to be considered for those areas at that time, and have the necessary capabilities and experience required in those particular technology or functional areas. When new expertise areas are added, PSC may solicit responses from offerors who do not at that time hold an IDIQ contract under this program. An offeror may qualify to provide support for one or more areas of expertise on the IDIQ contract.

All work to be performed under the IDIQ contract will be awarded by task order. Task orders will be structured by program objective, in whole or in part, at the discretion of the government (see Section C.4 for more information).

This RFP also solicits offers for Objective 1 in the PeopleSoft area of expertise only. PSC intends to award multiple IDIQ contracts within the PeopleSoft expertise area, plus one task order for Objective 1. A holder of an IDIQ contract from this solicitation will be considered qualified to provide support for future program objectives within the PeopleSoft area of expertise.

Individual task orders may be awarded on a time-and-materials (T&M) or firm-fixed-price basis. Task orders may be fully funded, or funded by phases or options. The number of hours per labor category, other direct costs, and travel costs will be negotiated for each task order.

C. Statement of Objectives

This section describes PSC’s needs for EHRP application support services.

C.1 PSC Mission

Created in 1995 to reduce duplication in federal administrative support services, PSC provides shared services to HHS, its component agencies, and other federal agencies on a competitive fee-for-service basis, allowing the agencies to focus on their core missions. PSC provides some 60 products and support services, including administrative operations, financial management, human resources, strategic acquisition, and federal occupational health.

PSC established a center of excellence, Enterprise Support Services (ESS), to deliver O&M services for enterprise applications at HHS, its component agencies, and other federal agencies on a competitive fee-for-service basis. ESS’s O&M support for enterprise applications includes financial management, acquisition management, and HR management. Within the HR management area, ESS manages state-of-the-art HR processing, time and attendance, and payroll interface applications and delivers the highest level of customer service to HHS employees. ESS works closely with HHS and other federal agencies to develop, deliver, and support the best possible HR systems that use the latest available technology and maximize efficiency.

Currently, ESS’s EAD manages delivery of O&M services for the HHS enterprise HR systems. EAD delivers these services using a mix of federal and contractor resources. EAD serves every operating division (OpDiv) at HHS and also offers its services to all federal agencies.

C.2 EAD Current Environment This section describes EAD’s current systems and organizational environment. It also summarizes EAD’s recent program activity and its business environment and program goals.

C.2.1 EAD Systems Environment

Figure 1 shows the current EAD systems environment.

Figure 1. Current EAD Systems Environment

As the figure shows, EAD operates and maintains the following distinct enterprise systems:

· EHRP—the HHS enterprise HR management solution, which uses an HHS-specific configuration of the PeopleSoft HCM software. EHRP interfaces to the Department’s Unified Financial Management System (UFMS), Accounting for Pay System (AFPS), and time-and-attendance system (ITAS); to OpDiv-specific HR data repositories; and to all enterprise HR reporting tools. In addition, EHRP interfaces support payroll processing by the Defense Finance and Accounting Service (DFAS). EHRP uses an Oracle database and is implemented on a Unix and Windows platform. EAD maintains the following:

· PeopleSoft HCM (U.S. Federal Government version 8.9)

· Base Benefits version 8.9

· Benefits Administration version 8.9

· PeopleSoft Payroll Interface version 8.9

· PeopleTools version 8.48.04

· Server hardware (HP-UX version 11.11)

· Relational database management system (Oracle version 9.2.0.8).

· ITAS—Integrated Time and Attendance System—the time and attendance solution, which uses a government off-the-shelf (GOTS) product. ITAS provides information to the payroll process and is deployed nationwide. ITAS operates on a Windows and Sun Solaris platform and uses an SQL server database management system.

· EWITS—Enterprise Workflow Information Tracking System—the HandySoft BizFlow business process management and workflow automation system, which facilitates the management of HR activities, such as recruitment, employee relations/labor relations, retirement, and awards, and which records workflow metrics allowing EAD to monitor and track HR performance and self serve items such as parking and Transhare.

· BIIS—Business Intelligence Information System—the enterprise reporting solution using SAP Business Objects, which provides custom and ad hoc reporting of HR information and performance data. The reporting solution uses Oracle DBMS in conjunction with Business Objects, and it runs on an HP Unix platform.

In addition, the EAD systems inventory includes TITAN, an MVS mainframe using JCL, and PAST, a WANG database containing historical information on prior HHS employees.

C.2.2 EAD Organization

In 2005, EAD underwent an A-76 competitive sourcing study. The government team won the competition and implemented a Most Efficient Organization (MEO) in July 2006. With the implementation of the MEO, the government downgraded positions, reduced the number of positions, and offered buyouts. Figure 2 shows EAD’s organization. The organization comprises 58 federal full-time equivalent (FTE) positions supporting a Residual Government Organization (RGO), an MEO Program Office, and four branches: functional, technical–applications, technical–reports, and systems/operations.

Figure 2. EAD Organizational Components (Federal Personnel)

The EAD RGO, in conjunction with the MEO and ESS, sets program direction, identifies strategic initiatives, sets level-of-service agreements and program performance thresholds with customer agencies, enters into agreements with all O&M service providers, and manages vendor and program performance.

The functional, applications, and systems/operations branches manage operations, maintenance, development, and infrastructure activities associated with supporting the EHRP, ITAS, EWITS, and PAST applications. More specifically, the functional branch works with EAD’s fee-for-service customer agencies to identify business needs and address change requests for supported applications. The EAD functional branch assesses customer satisfaction in weekly and monthly outreach meetings. This branch also provides help desk services—through the ESS help desk—to ITAS and EHRP users and supports the Change Control Board (CCB). The applications branch supports development activities required to fix or enhance all systems with the exception of BIIS. Finally, the systems/operations branch maintains the EAD infrastructure.

The reports branch develops, operates, and maintains enterprise HR reporting through BIIS.

The branch chiefs are supported by a mix of federal and contractor employees. Table 1 identifies the major contractor roles that support EAD’s delivery of enterprise HR and time and attendance services.

Table 1. Major EAD Contractor Support Roles

ESS program management support (Business Intelligence, Inc.)

Enhance overall performance for O&M services across enterprise system programs reporting to ESS to ensure customer satisfaction, support coordination and communication, and recommend program direction, including business goals and strategies. As a result, BI provides some program management support to EAD.

Software vendor support Support changes to COTS code. For example, EAD works with PeopleSoft and the federal user community on EHRP and with the National Institutes of Health (NIH) on ITAS.

Hosting support

(NIH CIT)

Host EHRP, ITAS, and BIIS applications and provide infrastructure support for the production environment.

a EAD federal personnel operate and maintain nearly the entire EHRP infrastructure, utilizing contractors for narrowly defined purposes such as database administration support or for technical expertise with either the EHRP application or supporting tools on targeted issues.

EAD will continue to monitor program requirements to determine if and when changes to its operating structure, including the current mix of contractor roles, are necessary.

C.2.3 Recent Program Activity

The majority of the EAD workload from October to January of each calendar year consists of activities to support HHS year-end HR processing, such as open enrollment, annual pay adjustments, and catch-up contributions. In the remaining months of the year, EAD focuses on improving system performance and enhancing the systems to support implementation of CCB-approved changes.

EAD supports approximately 4,000 user accounts on EHRP. EHRP users include personnel specialists and approving officials at each HHS customer agency. In FY09, EAD closed 3,110 help desk requests, completed 75 coding changes that were migrated to EHRP, and implemented monthly point releases. In addition, EAD executed approximately 50 data fixes per pay period in FY09. (Pay periods occur biweekly.) Overall, since the PeopleSoft HCM upgrade to 8.9 in October 2007, EAD has closed more than 7,600 help desk tickets. As of January 19, 2010, EAD had 452 open tickets, over 80% of which are one year old or less. EAD is interested in further reducing its backlog.

EAD also manages numerous high-value strategic initiatives each year to improve operations and address customer concerns. For example, EAD enhanced EHRP to support Title 38 and Title 45 employees and to support market pay, converted the in-house payroll system to DFAS, upgraded from HCM 8.0 to 8.9, and upgraded from Oracle 8 to 9. EAD recently implemented single sign-on for EHRP, the largest application within HHS to provide that functionality.

Attachment A contains additional information about program workload, the EHRP environments, interfaces, and customizations.

C.2.4 EAD Business Environment and Program Goals As part of the President’s Management Agenda, HHS was selected as one of five HR Line of Business (HR LOB) service providers. EAD’s EHRP serves as the HHS platform for federal personnel and payroll services. EAD is planning to further develop its HR LOB offerings. That is, EAD intends to expand its catalog of services available on a fee-for-service basis. EAD also seeks to expand its delivery of enterprise HR O&M services to additional customer agencies within 3 to 5 years. Therefore, the program may grow due to new service offerings and new customers.

In addition, EAD continues to move toward establishing a streamlined enterprise architecture, which may result in adding functionality to existing enterprise applications. For example, EAD is considering transitioning to an Oracle platform for the PAST database. It also plans to evaluate options for replacing the current GOTS time and attendance system with a commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) system. EAD also expects multiple strategic initiatives related to an anticipated major upgrade to PeopleSoft HCM 9.x (version 9.0 or higher) in FY11.

Recently, EAD underwent changes in its executive leadership and organization. EAD now reports to PSC’s ESS under a new director. Under ESS leadership, EAD anticipates implementing a number of initiatives aimed at improving internal O&M processes and overall program readiness. For example, EAD has implemented daily reporting meetings to assess system readiness and status of high-priority issues across EAD systems. EAD anticipates increasing its reliance on operational metrics and reporting to enhance operations. Over time, EAD is seeking to further strengthen the O&M capabilities of its federal staff and to establish better tuned operations to ensure optimum performance of EAD systems.

EAD is committed to maintaining a service delivery approach that is responsive, manageable, scalable, accountable, and transparent. EAD wants to be a state-of-the-art solution provider to federal agencies, to meet and exceed customer performance goals, and to maintain and improve current operations.

EAD seeks to remain federally compliant; deliver timely, secure, and accurate services; and maintain high customer satisfaction. EAD’s goals for its enterprise HR application support services program are as follows:

· Goal area 1: Maintain customer satisfaction

· G1—Ensure that customer and stakeholder requests are properly fulfilled and tracked

· G2—Maintain high customer satisfaction

· G3—Support timely rollout of changes to EAD-supported applications, while providing uninterrupted application services to existing customers

· Goal area 2: Improve system performance

· G4—Maintain system availability and capacity

· Goal area 3: Maintain and improve internal O&M

· G5—Support functional and technical releases, upgrades, patches, and technical security across all EAD-supported applications

· G6—Reduce change-related incidents with effective release processes and testing

· G7—Ensure program-wide success in key events such as audit and year-end processing

· Goal area 4: Ensure program knowledge transfer

· G8—Ensure knowledge transfer to federal personnel

· G9—Minimize the impact of staffing attrition on program delivery of services by maintaining documentation and reducing turnover in contractor personnel.

C.3 EAD Acquisition Goals C.3.1 EAD Acquisition Strategy

In the near term, EAD is seeking to secure and maintain its enterprise HR application support services program by acquiring support services for the EHRP, BIIS, and EWITS applications. EAD must also secure and maintain functional subject matter expertise services specific to HHS business processes and the current configuration of EHRP. In the long term, EAD may also seek support in the area of quality assurance as it continues to enhance and optimize its overall performance. Within the PeopleSoft HCM area of expertise, EAD has an immediate requirement for EHRP application support. EAD has also identified Business Objects as another technological area of expertise and HR functional knowledge as a functional area of expertise.

To fulfill its acquisition needs within these areas of expertise, EAD plans to establish two primary acquisition vehicles: an IDIQ contract targeting application support services by small business providers, and a GSA Schedule blanket purchase agreement (BPA) targeting a mix of large and small business providers. Based upon its prior market research, EAD will use the IDIQ vehicle initially to obtain application support services—defined as O&M, new development, and strategic analytical support services—in the PeopleSoft HCM area of expertise. EAD plans to obtain subject matter expertise and functional support services in the EAD HR functional knowledge area of expertise through the BPA.

As EAD identifies additional areas of expertise for which it requires assistance, EAD will evaluate the extent to which capable small business providers that can deliver the desired services. Where such capability exists, EAD will offer new areas of expertise under the IDIQ vehicle. (In this case, PSC would open the IDIQ to capable vendors in the new expertise area; see Section B.) Where such capability does not exist, EAD will offer the area of expertise under the BPA. Examples of future areas of expertise are Business Objects reporting, HR workflow, and application support for a time and attendance system.

When offered, the area of expertise may be associated with one or more task orders, defined as program objectives. As indicated in Section B of this RFP, over time, EAD plans to issue multiple task orders/objectives within an expertise area.

C.3.2 Current Acquisition At this time, EAD is issuing two RFPs consecutively, one for the IDIQ vehicle and one for the BPA. Each acquisition is associated with an initial program objective, as shown in Table 2.

Table 2. Overview of Current Acquisitions

expertise

A.

Enterprise HR application support services

IDIQ

vehicle

February 2010

Award:

April 2010 Small business

B.

EAD enterprise HR resource support

Not applicable

By establishing an IDIQ contract for enterprise HR application support services in the PeopleSoft HCM area of expertise and issuing the first task order for EHRP application O&M support, PSC is obtaining O&M support services specific to the EAD EHRP application. In other words, this action establishes contractor support for the EHRP application O&M support role shown in Table 2. To obtain functional knowledge specific to the HHS configuration of EHRP, PSC is establishing a new GSA BPA and issuing the initial task order for HHS EHRP functional O&M support. This action will establish contractor support for the EHRP functional O&M support role shown in Table 2.

PSC is pursuing acquisitions A and B consecutively. The scope of this RFP is strictly limited to acquisition A: delivery of enterprise HR application support services in the PeopleSoft HCM area of expertise. Within acquisition A, EAD seeks submissions from firms whose core competencies align with the service capability areas (O&M, new development, strategic analytical support) and can deliver a strong value proposition to PSC. Only vendors with expertise in PeopleSoft HCM (as defined in this RFP) should respond to this RFP.

PSC will not open other areas of expertise on this IDIQ vehicle at this time; rather, PSC is in the process of determining the acquisition timeline for additional area of expertise offerings. When it determines the next area of expertise required by EAD, PSC will open the IDIQ vehicle to potential offerors who possess that expertise.

C.4 IDIQ Vehicle Overview C.4.1 Scope of Services

The scope of the IDIQ contract corresponds to the requirements specified in Section C.5 of this RFP. Specifically, this RFP focuses on a range of service capability areas that PSC may require to ensure effective operation of EAD-supported applications. These service capability areas correspond to the enterprise HR application support services requirements in Section C.5 as follows:

· Operations and maintenance services—corresponds to requirement areas 2.0 (application operations), 3.0 (application maintenance and development), and 5.0 (infrastructure management).

· New development services—corresponds to requirement area 4.0 (new development)

· Strategic analytical support services—corresponds to requirement area 6.0 (strategic analytical support services).

In addition, objectives under the enterprise HR application support services program may require transition services (requirement area 1.0), knowledge transfer services (requirement area 7.0), and project management services (requirement area 8.0).

Consequently, at its sole discretion, PSC may issue future task orders to IDIQ contract holders for a range of support services relating to the following:

· Implementation of the EAD program objectives as described in this document

· Implementation of EAD strategies and other follow-on activities relating to the program objectives

· Performance of enterprise applications and overall EAD service delivery

· Other tasks necessary to support the effective implementation, enhancement, operations, or maintenance of enterprise applications that require expertise in one or more technology or functional areas of expertise.

C.4.2 Future Optional Areas of Expertise

At this time, EAD is focusing on one area of expertise: PeopleSoft HCM (U.S. Federal Government version 8.9 or higher). To ensure the ongoing performance of its enterprise HR applications, EAD may require O&M, new development, and strategic analytical support services in other areas of technological or functional expertise in the future. When it decides to acquire support for another area of expertise, EAD will require offerors to apply their knowledge of the area of expertise to the activities specified in Section C.6 of this RFP. For example EAD may require support for many tasks associated with ensuring smooth day-to-day operations of a specific application. Examples of required support are as follows:

· Continuing operation of the application

· Reviewing or implementing application changes, system enhancements, COTS changes, software patches, tool upgrades, interface modifications, regulatory changes, or changes in HHS or OpDiv HR policy

· Assessing impacts to the application and its interfaces associated with customer changes or with other strategic initiatives identified by ESS or EAD

· Monitoring, maintaining, and enhancing system performance, including optimizing performance tuning of the system environments.

EAD task requirements for each program objective within an area of expertise may vary considerably in the scope of expertise required and in duration. For example, some objectives may require new development services only, while others may require expertise that spans all three service capability areas. Future objectives may be added and awarded, in whole or in part, at the discretion of the government. Table 3 shows the concept for acquiring the needed enterprise HR application support services.

Table 3. Approach to Acquiring Enterprise HR Application Support Services

development Strategic analytical support

PeopleSoft HCM

Future objective

Future objective

Future area of expertise

Future objective

No future areas of expertise are identified at this time.

C.4.3 Performance-Based Acquisition

EAD enterprise HR application support services are being procured as a performance-based acquisition to encourage innovative and creative solutions, and not hamper, dictate, or prescribe how the work must be performed. The use of an SOO is an emerging method that transforms the acquisition process by requiring each competing offeror to propose a technical approach, work breakdown structure, project plan and schedule, schedule of deliverable items, performance metrics and associated standards, measurement plan, and quality assurance plan. In other words, the focus of the SOO is on “what” PSC is trying to achieve instead of “how” it must be achieved.

C.4.4 PSC Support Contractor

Offerors are advised that PSC has retained a support contractor, Business Intelligence, Inc. (BI)—a service-disabled veteran-owned contractor located at 4031 University Drive, Suite 200, Fairfax, VA 22030—to serve as the service management organization to ESS. BI is utilizing LMI—located at 2000 Corporate Ridge, McLean, VA 22102—to provide support during the PSC enterprise HR application support services acquisition. BI and LMI are expressly prohibited from competing on the subject acquisition. To enable them to perform their duties, BI and LMI will be authorized access to any proprietary information submitted.

BI and LMI have provided the government with signed statements in which they agree not to use or disclose any acquisition-sensitive information to which they have access as a result of performing work in support of this acquisition, except as required to perform that work.

Submission of a response to the RFP represents the offeror’s acknowledgement of and agreement to BI’s and LMI’s participation in the evaluation of responses under the above conditions.

C.5 IDIQ Vehicle Application Support Requirements

In general, EAD enterprise HR application support encompasses the day-to-day activities required to keep the program operating smoothly and effectively across all applications supported by EAD. These required activities are to manage and implement changes, manage and resolve issues, provide quality assurance prior to implementing changes, support management of the content of new software releases, support management of the environments where application code and data reside, support the successful migration of new releases into production, and ensure timely and effective communication on the impact of changes to end users. Other critical program elements include ensuring timely response to customer requests and ensuring performance of the underlying technical infrastructure as required to maintain EAD applications.

These requirements apply to all current and future areas of expertise under the IDIQ contract.

C.5.1 Requirement Area 1.0: Transition Services

At contract award, the contractor will assume the application service activities currently performed by the incumbent. The government expects offerors to propose a viable transition approach, considering existing program activities and the short transition period. The contractor must provide both transition-in and transition-out services.

C.5.1.1 Requirement Area 1.1: Transition In

Upon contract award, the contractor is expected to transition the application support services from the outgoing contractor. As part of this requirement, the contractor shall obtain the necessary security clearances and badges for transition team resources before transition support can begin. At the onset of the contract, the contractor shall also obtain, from the outgoing contractor, essential application support documentation used by the incumbent to operate and maintain the application. The contractor shall also develop and execute a government-approved transition plan that details the activities required, resources employed, and time frames of milestones and deliverables.

The contractor shall work with the outgoing contractor to learn the application and the EAD O&M processes and procedures required to provide application support services. After knowledge has been transferred from the outgoing contractor, the incoming contractor shall demonstrate the ability to execute these O&M application processes and procedures without assistance from the outgoing contractor or the government. After successful completion of the demonstration, the contractor shall assume full responsibility for application operations and development support services from the outgoing contractor.

C.5.1.2 Requirement Area 1.2: Transition Out

The contractor shall provide support to transfer knowledge to a new contractor, or federal personnel, when the period of performance of this task order ends. The contractor shall also assist the government with preparing materials (such as demonstration scenarios and evaluation criteria) necessary for the incoming contractor to demonstrate its proficiency in performing the system O&M activities.

C.5.2 Requirement Area 2.0: Application Operations

These services require the support of both functional and technical resources. Functional resources are primarily responsible for supporting end users during period close; supporting audit and information requests; and analyzing reported incidents, resolving those requiring functional clarification and passing remaining incidents to technical resources for resolution. Technical resources are primarily responsible for resolving incidents that require changes to the application, monitoring the application, maintaining the application configuration, and analyzing patches and upgrades.

Application operations services include the daily activities required to support the application and users. Those activities fall into several key areas: application administration, issue resolution, configuration management, environment management, and security management.

C.5.2.1 Requirement Area 2.1: Application Administration

Application administration support includes the configuration and monitoring required to maintain EAD applications and interfaces each day, ensuring that they are operating accurately and efficiently. Examples of application administration services for EAD include performing system configuration maintenance such as maintaining initialization code, profile options, and parameters; setting up, deleting, and deactivating users and associated profiles; and coordinating with disaster recovery personnel to ensure that backups occur and are valid.

C.5.2.2 Requirement Area 2.2: Issue Resolution

EAD O&M follows a predefined incident resolution management process in which incidents are escalated through various levels and issues are assigned to the appropriate venders. The support levels are defined as follows:

· Level 1 consists of the ESS help desk support for issues relating to basic user navigation, business process, and technical support; call routing; prioritization; and call monitoring.

· Level 2 issue resolution of user problems resolved by functional experts guiding users through complex business issues.

· Level 3 consists of resolution of software problems and of complicated functional or technical issues requiring software or configuration changes.

When a user cannot resolve an issue using online help or job aids, the user initiates a Level 1 issue though the ESS help desk. The Level 1 ESS help desk personnel respond to administrative issues such as password resets and resolve issues related to basic business process and user navigation. Level 1 support personnel are also responsible for the general management of incidents, which involves recording, tracking, and ensuring resolution. When an issue cannot be resolved at Level 1, it is elevated to EAD’s Level 2 functional support team (EAD functional branch). The functional support team reviews the issue to determine if it can be resolved through user assistance or business process change or whether a software or configuration change is required. When a software or configuration change is required, the Level 2 staff escalates the issue to the Level 3 technical support team (EAD technical branch) for resolution.

EAD has primary responsibility for Levels 1 and 2, but may require additional support from the contractor as workflow dictates. The contractor is responsible for assisting the EAD functional and technical support teams with resolving Level 3 issues by providing functional and technical expertise, as well as supplemental resources. The contractor shall troubleshoot and resolve issues as assigned by EAD. EAD is the first point of contact for coordination with necessary parties (such as COTS vendors and infrastructure personnel) when required; however, the contractor shall perform this role as required and directed by the government. The contractor shall provide on-call support during the hours of 6:00 p.m. EST to 7:00 a.m. EST (outside of normal business operations) to the EAD production support staff.

The contractor shall provide support for end-of-pay-period processing,which occurs biweekly on Fridays. This support includes providing coverage between 5:00 p.m. on Friday through 5:00 p.m. the following Saturday on a biweekly basis. The contractor shall follow EAD change management processes and procedures for tracking, managing, and resolving issues.

C.5.2.3 Requirement Area 2.3: Configuration Management

Configuration management involves establishing application baselines and all associated configuration items, and maintaining the ongoing versioning of the baselines in a repository as new releases and enhancements are rolled out. Configurable items include application code and applicable documents. Within configuration management, EAD documentation on its operating policies and procedures needs to be continuously managed and maintained.

Release management involves determining and managing the content of new software releases and ensuring the successful migration of new releases into production.

The government is responsible for release management, as well as the production baseline and version configurations. The contractor is responsible for managing the configurations of all development and testing environments. The contractor shall follow EAD’s configuration management policies and practices and use the EAD configuration management tool, provided by the government, to maintain the development and testing environment configurations.

The contractor shall participate in release planning activities to ensure that the content of each release accurately reflects the required configuration. The contractor shall develop, maintain, and supply the list of configurable items, including code-related items, specific to the application for each release. The contractor shall support release migrations by performing any required migration checklist activities, provide status on these activities, and participate in migration checklist walk-throughs and production readiness reviews as directed by the government. In addition, the contractor shall provide on-call support beyond 6:00 p.m. on the day each monthly release is migrated (currently occurring on Fridays) and on the following day (currently Saturdays).

C.5.2.4 Requirement Area 2.4: Environment Management

Environment management involves managing the environment in which the application code and data reside, as well as managing the application code configuration items. EAD is responsible for managing and maintaining the various development, testing, training, and production instances/environments. The contractor shall work with EAD to ensure the configuration integrity of all environments as changes assigned to the contractor are applied. The contractor shall work with EAD to periodically synchronize the development and testing instances with the production instance.

C.5.2.5 Requirement Area 2.5: Security Management

Security support is required to assist the PSC chief information security officer (CISO) with assessing, reviewing, developing, preparing, updating, and documenting existing and new IT security policies, procedures, and plans. In addition, EAD will periodically need to update or renew the security certification and accreditation (C&A) for each EAD application. C&A activities include the development of quarterly plans of action and milestones, privacy impact assessments, and practices to maintain compliance with HHS and federal security regulations, such as mandates stated in the Federal Information Security Management Act, Office of Management and Budget Circular A-123, SAS-70, National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) publications, and Federal Financial Management Improvement Act.

In support of security management, the contractor shall follow security maintenance policies and procedures as directed by the government. These policies and procedures govern activities such as controlling and monitoring user roles and responsibilities. The contractor shall recommend corrective actions to audit remediation findings as assigned. In conjunction with configuration management responsibilities, the contractor shall ensure that impacts from its audit remediation activities are captured in EAD O&M policy and process documentation. In addition, the contractor shall support all audit, compliance, and C&A activities as requested by the CISO and must draft responses to any security requests specified by the CISO. Finally, the contractor shall support security-related changes such as updating permission lists and modifying user profiles and application windows to allow or disallow the use of certain features.

C.5.3 Requirement Area 3.0: Application Maintenance and Development

Application maintenance and development encompass the activities required to keep EAD applications operating effectively while implementing change requests, patches, and upgrades consistent with HHS security policies. The focus of application maintenance and development support is on the introduction of changes to the system and includes requirements analysis, design and development, testing, and change communication and training. For some changes and updates, the contractor shall conduct an impact analysis, including resource, cost, and schedule estimates to support EAD decision making and prioritization.

Quality assurance plays a key role in these development support activities. Consequently, PSC requires a comprehensive approach to testing and a strong emphasis and adherence to EAD standard operating processes. The contractor shall ensure documentation of all changes and also mentor the government staff to transition and assume responsibility for changes and interfaces designated by HHS in accordance with its established and documented timeline.

Development support services require both functional and technical resources. Functional resources are primarily responsible for preparing requirements documentation, preparing communications and training materials, training users on the changes, and testing software changes. Technical resources are primarily responsible for the design and development activities required to support change requests.

Application maintenance and development activities fall into several key areas: application development, patch and upgrade management, change management, and quality assurance testing.

C.5.3.1 Requirement Area 3.1: Application Development

Application development involves the implementation of approved change requests and fixes. Change requests are necessary to accommodate new regulatory updates, interfacing system updates, and COTS product changes affecting EAD’s implementation.

Change requests fall into one of two categories: break fixes and releases. Break fixes are initiated through incident resolution management and involve changes to ensure the system is functioning as designed. Releases are changes that enhance or modify the system design. Some changes may require significant new development. Major releases are treated as projects and must follow EAD’s full development life cycle as described under requirement area 4.0. Application development services for EAD include performing an impact assessment that will identify the level of effort and cost associated with each requested change, making any configuration or coding changes necessary, coordinating with the COTS vendor as necessary, and testing the changes to ensure they are functioning as designed. The contractor shall supplement EAD’s federal development staff and support EAD in performing assigned application development activities.

C.5.3.2 Requirement Area 3.2: Patch and Upgrade Management

Patch and upgrade management involve assessing the impact of application and database upgrades, as well as recommending and coordinating the implementation of application patches and upgrades. In support of patch and upgrade management, the contractor shall do the following:

· Perform strategic planning associated with patches and upgrades, which includes identifying the need for and associated impacts of the patch or upgrade

· Coordinate with the change management and application development teams as necessary to ensure a smooth and error-free implementation

· Determine the implementation schedule for the patch or upgrade

· Coordinate with the hosting site to ensure that the hardware and tools are in place before implementing the patch or upgrade

· Test the patch or upgrade to ensure that any new functionality is operating properly and existing functionality has not been negatively impacted.

Major upgrades, such as the migration to PeopleSoft 9.x, shall follow the full development life cycle and include sufficient planning and preparation to ensure success. The requirements associated with the full life-cycle development process are documented in requirement area 4.0.

C.5.3.3 Requirement Area 3.3: Change Management

Change management involves managing change to the users’ business processes or application functionality based on the implementation of change requests. EAD personnel are responsible for change management; the contractor will support the federal staff as required. The contractor shall review assigned changes, identify training implications (if any), and prepare job aids and update the On Demand training tool as necessary. The contractor shall also review the implications of business process changes and work with EAD to ensure that business process changes are coordinated with the system changes as they are rolled out to users. The contractor shall also prepare and execute communications plans and communications materials.

C.5.3.4 Requirement Area 3.4: Quality Assurance Testing

Quality assurance testing involves the activities required to test application fixes, change requests, patches, and upgrades. The purpose of quality assurance testing, which is performed after an application is developed, is to expand on and independently validate the testing performed by the application development team. Quality assurance testing includes functional testing of software changes to ensure changes meet specified requirements, integration testing to ensure all interfaces and integration points are functioning properly, regression testing to ensure the entire system is functioning as designed, and user acceptance testing to ensure user acceptance of any changes.

The contractor must prepare a quality assurance testing approach and plan, which must be reviewed and approved by the government. The government will also participate in test execution. Upon completion of quality assurance testing, the government will review the test results and make a final determination as to whether the software changes or new development meets the specified requirements.

The contractor shall provide the functional and technical subject matter expertise to prepare test plans, scenarios, and scripts and conditions required for testing changes and fixes. In this capacity, the contractor shall determine the overall test approach and plan for each change or new development. The contractor shall develop test cycles based on the functional areas, create test scripts and conditions, and prepare an execution schedule. Upon approval of the test approach and plan, the contractor shall perform quality assurance testing (as described above) through the execution of these plans, scenarios, and scripts and shall identify and report incidents. The contractor shall track incidents ensuring that they are fixed by the development team, and retest the fixes upon completion.