Q A_2_08202016.pdf

Question Answer 1 Are DAWIA or FAC-C certifications required, or will equivalent commercial certificate (e.g., NCMA) or appropriate combination of experience, education, and training be acceptable substitutions?

Qualifications "commensurate" with DAWIA or FAC-C certifications. Commercial equivelencies are acceptable or similar combination of experience, education and training as would be required by those certifications.

2 Please confirm the Government’s meaning by the word “system” in the first sentence of C.3.3? Does the Government mean more of a “methodology or process?

"System" in this sentence refers to the business processes.

3 For scenario #1 response, are we to assume this is a competitive procurement, or is a sole source contemplated?

Competitive.

Q&A #2

RFP: SS1301-16-RP-0010

Questions Through August 20, 2016

4 Regarding #29 of the Amendment 1 Q&A:

a. If the Commodity and Service Order methodology is intended to be in lieu of staff augmentation:

i. How is the contractor expected to perform the work/place the orders?

ii. Is it intended that the work would be assigned by the contractor to an already existing contract acquisition support staff member or would we be expected to perform with our home office overhead labor?

1. If the former is the case, wouldn't the services already be covered by the funded task order that the acquisition staff member supports?

2. If the latter is true, given home office employees wouldn't be assigned directly to the contract, how would we gain access to your systems and ordering vehicles?

b. Given that Section B and J.1 are requesting 5-year firm fixed prices, without being inside the DOC EAO infrastructure with access to and an understanding of its systems, vehicles, processes and procedures for completing such packages, how are we to accurately estimate the cost of completing 20 commodity and 10 service order packages?

a. Estimating pricing for completing orders against existing contracts is relatively straight forward approach if you are aware of how the process works. Because a streamlined path to acquisition exists under a pre-competed contract, the estimated time to complete an action is fairly routine.

No individuals under the staff augmentation (pay for time) will be the same people who would be performing the designated FFP orders; and both groups of people would be in the EAO office. Finally, because both have direct pay for expressed goods or services, neither are overhead.

Consider this example to help visualize: We require 2 ordering specialists to work 8 hours per day every day for a year. They will fall under the pricing structure of the hourly price for 1920 hours and process orders repetitively while sitting in the EAO. In addition, we require (order) 200 additional commodity orders to be processed in 3 months. The QTY of 10 X the proposed FFP for 20 orders will be ordered for performance delivery and will be paid upon performance of the those 200 orders (or at some defined interval). The contractor will have to supply ordering specialists in addition to the 2 above to accomplish those 200 orders. It will be up to the contractor to supply 1 person or 10 people as they deem necessary which will have a corresponding impact on the time it takes to complete those 200 orders and receive payment, so long as they are done within the time allotted. The FFP of the order processing, like any FFP would need to cover the cost of the work, overheads and profit/fee.

b. Consider previous experiences.

5 Follow-on question to Q&A 1, question 34: The instructions clearly state that we are to provide a mock pre-award contract file to include an acquisition package, all process steps to achieve preparedness to release the solicitation, and any workflow steps (optional) that will be needed prior to solicitation release. The answer to #34 seems to state that the offeror is not only required to deliver the entire detailed mock pre-award contract file, but also a full Request for Proposal (RFP) “solicitation”.

Please confirm that you are requiring the entire RFP with this scenario?

For the sake of clarity, I have revised the Section L.3.B statement to “requirements package” in lieu of acquisition package (page 70). The acquisition package refers to the pre-award (mock) contract file required by the solicitation.

The pre-award contract file begins with receipt of the requirements package and ends with source selection. To get from requirements to source selection, a solicitation (RFP) must be issued (the end point for the mock file proposal submission). In order to issue a solicitation, one must be developed.

6 Based on the request to prepare a business case in Scenario #2, the gov't references the extent to which information (spend and demand) is available through available sources yet sources are not identified. Can the gov't please elaborate on the source of this information for FY 14, 15, and 16 to date and provide location for this information?

The purpose of the scenario is to asscertain the offeror's ability to locate such information. Hoever, several potential sources of information are FPDS, USAspending.gov and other commercially available data mining sites for which subscriptions may be required.

7 Can the govenernment provide the current process for strategic sourcing? A 30 second google search revealed this which is a good place to start:

https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/memoranda/2013/m-13- 02_0.pdf

8 Would the government be amenable to a different annotation format of Scenario #1 for process and workflow rather than separate blue and orange paper (e.g. blue and orange swim lane identifiers or flow charts depicting blue process steps and orange workflow steps)?

No. Generally, all process steps result in a documentation effort in the pre-award file. For example, a required legal review needs to be documented. In order to comply with the literal and spirit of the intent to demonstrate the konwledge of the job you are seeking to be awarded a contract for, it needs to be placed in the file.

9 Due to the fact that the scenarios were not included in the draft RFP, would the government consider issuing an extention to allow for a timely, detailed response?

A draft RFP was not issued. The awareness of the need to be familiar with Commerce acquisition regulations and policies in order to respond this requirement has been publically available since March 11, 2016. An short 1-day extension until 1:00 pm ET on Tuesday 8/30 is granted to allow for mailing of documents on Monday opposed to the Friday before.

10 Can you please confirm the shipping address that should be used to mail the proposal?

US Department of Commerce ATTN: Anthony Kram 1401 Constitution Ave, NW Suite A-200, RM A-257 Washington, DC 20230

11 Will resumes be excluded from the 25 page count for Volume I? or will they be counted towards the 25 page limit?

Resumes are part of the Volume 1 submission and count towards the page limit.

12 Reference RFP section M.2(b) page 77. The RFP states: “The Government reserves the right to assess the past performance of proposed subcontractors” Will subcontractor past performance be considered equal to prime past performance? Will all submitted team past performance be treated equally?

The process for assessing subcontractor past performance is the same as the prime. Good subcontractor past performance would make a good prime past performance stronger and conversely for weak subcontractor past performance.

However, for a couple reasons, the prime's past performance will always be the leading indicator in this assessment. First, only the Prime has the obligation under contract to perform and the Governent does not have privity with subcontractors.

The prime must perform at least 51% of the work. Subcontractors may come and go throughout the performance period. Additionally, some offerors may not be utilizing sub-contractors creating an imbalance in the evaluation if subcontractor past performance were to take even or more weight than the prime.

13 What is the anticipated date of contract award? The expectation is to have an award decision by the end of October.

14 Request an extension to Friday September 2nd. It is understood that the response to this RFP is somewhat unique and in many ways complex. However, the response required demonstrates the capabilities of firms who have an indepth knowledge of Federal acquisition. A further extension beyond that noted in question 9 above is not granted.

15 Section L.3.A: Page Limitation. Pages shall be numbered sequentially from “1” through the total number of pages in the volume. The proposal shall not exceed the page limits stated for each volume. Any pages in excess of that listed will be disregarded, and will not be included in the proposal evaluation. Failure of the offeror to comply with the page limitations, resulting in the excess pages not being evaluated, shall not constitute grounds for a protest. The Government will not accept any changes to the offeror’s proposal after the closing date of the solicitation. Page limits include: all appendices, charts, graphs, diagrams, tables, photographs, drawings, etc.

Given that the Page Limits do not apply to “covers for volumes, and tables of contents, indices, title pages, cross reference indices, section dividers/tables if they are inserted solely to provide ease to the reader in locating parts/sections of the proposal, and the Price Proposal Labor Rate Chart (J.1)” is it acceptable that the Page number 1 and subsequent page numbers begin on the 1st page of proposal response text?

This is acceptable. Keep in mind that the Government will only consider the first X number of pages of content allowed by the solicittion, regardless of the page number. The page number merely helps the process.

In other words, a proposal that has 27 numbered pages with a 25 page limit, but has a table of contents and a blank divider page as numbered pages would meet the constraints of the page limits. And, a proposal that has technical content on an un-numbered page would be counted as a page towards the limits.

16 Section L.3, B.2 – Past Performance - What is the minimum number of past performances references required in the proposal submission?

A minimum a maximum limit is not specified. You can supply as many or few as you like that fit within the page limits.

17 Section M.2 Evaluation Method; 1352.215-75 Evaluation Criteria – This sections states, “The evaluation will consist of three factors; Technical, Past Performance and Cost/Price. The Technical factor is more important than Past Performance and when the two non-price factors (Technical and Past Performance) are combined, they are approximately equal to price.”

Does the government intend to evaluate Technical and Past Performance based on a color-coded, narrative or some other rating scale to illustrate to what degree the Offeror’s proposal meets the evaluation criteria. Can the government please provide further clarification on this statement?

The Government will evaluate both technical and past performance using an adjectival rating system. The ratings or their definitions will not be disclosed prior to the award of this procurement. The ratings will identify the level of the offeror's capabilities and risks in releation to the evaluation criteria in Section M.

18 Section B, 11 & 12 Commodity and Service ordering. Would the government please confirm that they are looking for the bidder to provide cost on the process on not on the materials, licenses, etc. anticipated for purchase?

Yes, the cost provided for these two lines are for the services of completing the orders, not the cost of purchasing the goods or services required by our customers.

19 Section B, 11 & 12 Commodity and Service ordering. Would the government confirm that the numbers of 20 commodity packages and 10 service ordering packages is per year?

This is not correct. The period of performance to complete a set lot of orders will vary depending on demand. The premise of these two lines is to for the Government to buy a delivered service defined by numbers of orders, not staff's time (level of effort). It also allows the contractor the ability to scale it's workforce to deliver.

20 Section B, 11 & 12 Commodity and Service ordering. Would the government clarify if the commodities orders will be purchased through this contract or if only the process will be paid for by this contract?

This contract for which you are considering competing on is to support the role of the acquisition/procurement service provider to many customers wishing to purchase goods and services. Only what is captured in Section B is orderable under this contract. All commodities and services being purchased are under other contracts that have been established by the EOA.

21 Section L.B.1.c states that the “type and quantity of labor and materials is to be included in the Technical Proposal, without any associated cost information.” This seems inconsistent with Section M.1, Clause 1352.215- 73 which states “To evaluate offers for award purposes, the Government will apply the offeror's proposed fixed-prices/rates to the estimated quantities of use by year over the term. The estimated quantities will not be disclosed.” Please explain this apparent inconsistency.

Furthermore, since this will be Task Order contract, how can an offeror estimate the quantity of labor required until a Task Order is issued?

a. The statement in section L.B.1 refers only to the information supplied in the "Technical Volume" and requires the offeror to identify the type and quantity of labor and materials that are relative to fulfilling the technical requirements of the solicitation as a whole. The statement is worded as such so that offerors to not comingle their pricng information as described in L.B.3 in their technical proposal.

The statement at 1352.215-73 is further defined in M.2(c ) and applies to the "Cost/Price Volume" and both refer to how the Government will evaluate offers.

Neither have a compelling action on the part of the offeror.

b. An offeror need not estimate the quantity of labor. The solicitation is fairly explicit on what needs to be provided. Since there is no direct requirement coming out of the issuance of this "requirements" contract, supply the information being requested, which in this case is pricing by the hour for defined LCATs and by two lots of ordering activities. Task orders will then define the labor mix and quantity of the technical solution when placed.

22 Does the address listed for delivery of proposals for the subject solicitation allow for weekend deliveries?

I do not believe it does. So I have extended the due date by a day to allow offers to send via express delivery on Monday.

23 Section L. B.1.c reads, "In order that the technical proposal may be evaluated strictly on the merit of the material submitted, no contract price information is to be included in this volume. However, the type and quantity of labor and materials is to be included in the Technical Proposal, without any associated cost information.” Does the government require quantity of labor and materials to be included in the technical requirement? Are there particular sections where quantities are required or expected?

Same question as 21. Posting again since a couple potential offerors are focused on this. This particular contract action has no requirement for labor quantities or materials in the technical proposal.

24 Section L.B.2.c, in the event a company submits performance information of key personnel who have relevant experience in lieu of past performance is a different documentation format allowed?

In this case, you would need to provide information on how their past performance is relevant, with who and contact information for validation at the Government's discretion. As stated in the RFP, the Government has broad discretion and sources for locating and assessing past performance information.

25 Would Commerce please confirm the complexity of the commodity ordering packages to be completed? Are there are potential “roadblocks” that we need to be aware of? Is there currently a metrics and/or established procurement acquisition lead time for these type of awards?

If so what is the average and/or established turnaround time? How many FTEs typically work on each one? In order to price this CLIN it is important for industry to better understand the current or expected LOE for these packages

These orders are placed against established DOC contracts. The goal is commodity orders are within 10 calendar days, and services within 15 calendar days. Many of the commodity orders will take about an hour to process. One acquisition FTE will be working on any given order.

This requirement is only for the placement of orders. It does not require the administration of those orders such as invoicing.

For visulation purposes, think of this role as a "tiger-team" to keep up with ordering demand or reducing back-log.

26 Where have EAO policies and standard operating procedures been defined? Would Commerce please provide these?

The EAO does not have polices layered on top of the DOC policies. EAO SOP will be provided to the awardee as it is internal to the conduct of the business and communications functions of the EAO. They do not depart from the statutory or regulatory requirements of Federal acquisitions.

27 May an offeror elect to designate/introduce additional Key Personnel to their Technical Response (such as a Category Management Lead, for example)? If so, how would this affect the page limitations?

The only key personnel that will be evaluated are those designated in the solicitation. Offerors may propose other key personnel or functions as part of their technical capability response, for instance the "Management Plan" section.

All pages count towards the limit.

28 Typically Category Management/Strategic Sourcing work is performed on contractor site, where we have high-performance computing capability, bandwidth, and access to proprietary tools that accelerate data analytics.

Would Commerce consider requiring contractors to propose contractor-site rates, in additional to government-site rates, to allow for such work?

Separate rate structures from the requirement will not be introduced. Use of such tools and capabilities may be detailed as part of the technical response and costs for off-site support would need to be captured as overhead in the burdened labor rates.

29 To verify offerors’ procurement expertise will be delivered to Commerce, would the Government also request and evaluate Key Personnel resumes as part of Scenario #1?

No. The content of the material provided for scenario #1 will only be evaluated.

Such expertise is better suited as part of the Capabilities, Experience and Management Plan sections of Volume 1.

30 To verify offerors’ category-management expertise will be delivered to Commerce, would the Government also request and evaluate Key Personnel resumes as part of Scenario #2?

No. The content of the material provided for scenario #2 will only be evaluated.

Such expertise is better suited as part of the Capabilities, Experience and Management Plan sections of Volume 1.

31 Will the Government evaluate price realism as part of the price evaluation?

The Government will evaluate prices for reasonableness which includes they are realistic; however, the Government will not conducte a price realism analysis of offers.

32 We understand the premise behind the labor category descriptions being very general in nature as this allows DOC to leverage for a broad range of needs throughout the contract performance period. However, would Commerce consider adding on additional Labor Categories to allow for higher/SME-level support where it is deemed that a Subject Matter Expert in specific area would be beneficial to the government?

This was considered. An additional LCAT will not be added.

33 For Scenario 1 certain items are submitted by the customer, such as the Purchase Request, IGCE, Statement of Work, etc. It appears that offerors are to assume these provided items would already be in the pre-award file, and would not have to actually create them. Is this a correct assumption, or are offerors required to create those items and place them in the file, or perhaps include a Process Step naming those documents without placing the actual document in the mock file?

Correct, the "requisition package" provided in the scenario does not need to be recreated as part of the file. A process step should annotate the "requisition package" as the start point the mock file is built from.

34 In Scenario 1, where the file ends with a “complete solicitation”, to clarify, does that mean an actual complete Request For Proposals with provisions and clauses and all sections?

Yes. Note that the "technical" specifications (SOW) of a high performance computing system are not part of the scenario; however, a SOW that provides the general paragraphs and descriptions of what would be found in the SOW is part of the scenario. This is an acquisition technical exercise, not an engineering or IT technical exercise.

35 Can or should the mock pre-award file and/or business case in Scenario 2 be placed in a holed file folder or some means of keeping the documents together in a neat and orderly fashion?

Yes, they will need to be in chronological order and format.

36 Is it acceptable to submit a work/process flow diagram to satisfy building the contract file?

It is acceptable however this would be part of the technical capabilities/approach part of the proposal, not the scenarios.

37 Is it acceptable to assume that parts of the integrated project team’s tasks and coordination with applicable program offices (i.e., green purchasing and Section 508 have occurred – not just the checklists) and are included in the customer’s request package?

It is acceptable to assume that only the parts of the requirements package identified in Section L have been completed.

38 Can the same business case format be used in both Scenarios? Yes.

39 Since proposals are required to be sent to commercial or Government carrier, if there is a question about delivery, such as an unclear delivery receipt, can offerors call to verify that their package was received?

You can call however, if you have a tracking number on with your shipper, it will provide the date and time received by the DOC.

40 In regards to p. 71, Section L, Scenario 2; "Conduct a demand and spend analysis for the Department's purchases of furniture for FY14, 15 and 16 (to date). The report shall identify the volume (by dollars spent) of furniture procured by bureau to the extent the information is available through available resources. The report shall also aggregate the spend at the department level."

Does the "department level" refer to the Dept of Commerce as the agency's Headquarters, or the 12 Bureaus as stated within the solicitation SS1301-16-PR-0010 Original Synopsis post on FBO?

Department refers to the DOC as a whole. There would presumably be spend information for the 12 bureaus AND the Office of the Secretary/Headquarters element. The aggregate of all of this spend would provide the total "department level" spend.

41 What is the anticipated value and number of contractor staff that the government is planning on Task Order 1 (initial order quantity)?

This is important as it will allow contractors to determine appropriate overhead for the contract. 3.b. Will the initial obligation be awarded at the time of the contract award?

a. This is a requirements contract so it is not yet known. Initially, depending on program constraints and location, the first task order may only be for 1 or 2 staff support. Once the full stand-up occurs, it is anticipated around 15-20 staff support initially.

b. This depends on many factors not yet known; however, it is not anticipated that there will be an immediate task award with contract award.

42 If the HUBzone or SDVOSB prime has non-HUBzone or non-SDVOSB teaming partners as subcontractors, will the requirement be for the prime to maintain at least 51% of the workshare during the life of the contract?

Yes.

43 What background checks are required by DOC? What is the standard duration for contractor personnel to receive DOC security approval to begin work under the contract, sometimes called Entry On Duty (EOD)?

DOC has various means of conducting EOD background checks and they normally are completed within 2 weeks of submitting requisite application assuming there are no risky findings.

44 Section B #11 & #12. Will this fixed price line item be used separately or in conjunction with the T&M labor rates?

Orders may be issued on a FFP, T&M or hybrid basis. These particular two lines would be FFP as part of the order.

What is the expected period of performance for the High Performance Computing requirement? Is it considered a product and a service?

Delivery of a product/system. Contract for delivery in 24 months.

"The Government will evaluate the relevant merits of the offeror's past performance on the basis on it's record with its current and former customers." "If an offer does not have a history of relevant past performance, or indications of unsatisfactory performance in general, the offeror will receive a neutral past performance rating." Is it the governments intent to provide adjectival ratings for Relevancy and Confidence as it relates to the evaluation of Past Performance?

No relevant past performance and no "unsatisfactory" past performance in general will result in a neutral rating.

The adjectival ratings and definitions, other than that for neutral, will not be provided prior to award.

47 Section C.3.3 Performance Standards (p9) regarding ording activity turn around time differs from the Performance Requirements Summary PRS #3 Performance Threshold (p15). Will the government provide clarification?

Section C.3.3 states: Supply orders within 10 days and Service orders within 15 days.

PRS #3 states: "Orders shall be placed in accordance with standard processes in the timelines identified 95% of the time for supplies and 85% of the time for services. No order for supplies shall exceed 15 days processing time. No order for services shall exceed 30 days processing time.

There is no inconsistency here. The contractor must complete 95% of all Supply orders within 10 days per C.3.3 to be successful. For the 5% that may exceed 10 days, they cannot exceed 15 days. Same methodology for services.

48 Section C.3.3 Performance Standards (p9) regarding ording activity and the Performance Requirements Summary PRS #3 (p15) indicate the contractor's performance clock ends with the order is issued. Section B.3 states that the "Contract staff will not perform any inherently governmental functions under this contract." Will the government consider changing the Performance Standards to a metric that is within the control of the contractor such as when the order is submitted to the Contracting Officer for signature?

The clock stops when the properly placed order is submitted to the CO which will be promptly awarded. The CO's also have performance metrics for completing their duties. The language cannot be changed as you indicate because the mere submission of an order to a CO for signature does not validate its completeness or correctness.

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