Government Responses to Contractor Questions_W91YTZ25QA016.pdf

Contractor Questions with Government Responses W91YTZ25QA016

Question 1

We would like to know if this is a brand new contract OR if there is (was) an incumbent performing these services

Government Response Question 1

This is a new requirement.

Question 2

If you would consider a due date of January 13, 2025 we would be better able to prepare a response:

Government Response Question 2

The closing date will not be extended to January 13, 2025.

Question 3:

Reference PWS paragraphs 9.10, “The Government will only pay for full uninterrupted days of services provided. The Contractor shall only submit payment requests each month for the number of days of uninterrupted service actually provided that month. Submitting a payment request for more than the amount due may constitute fraud or a false claim and may result in administrative or criminal action or both.” And paragraph 10.2, “The Contractor shall maintain a 95% uptime rate for the duration of the period of performance. Uptime calculation shall be calculated as follows: number of days of uninterrupted service (e.g. days when the SPU is operational 24 hours without an equipment failure or downtime for maintenance) divided by number of days on the contract. Example: 54 days of uninterrupted service/60 days on the contract = 90% uptime rate). The contractor shall not charge for nor shall the government pay for any day where an interruption occurs regardless of the length of time to correct the interruption. Scheduled routine preventive maintenance and calibrations shall not be considered downtime. Also, minor failures with ancillary components which do not affect system availability shall not be considered in determining downtime.”

Clarify as the SPD is comprised of over 33 items and various subsystem components. If any one of these items were to need repair and per the calculation written above would this mean that that day for this singular item being down would count as a day and the government would not pay for this day? This despite all other items in the unit be operable?

We would already be committing to repair the unit or any equipment that needs corrective maintenance at no additional cost and within our published response times and all the other items in the unit would be useable and be in use. The example calculation does not seem to be realistic without significant cost additions to cover for the eventuality as the equipment will and does break and need service given the very caustic nature of water and steam just like in any SPD department.

Below are some examples for consideration and contemplation on this issue:

Example1:

One single Sterilizer (item 10) of the two sterilizers needs service for a failure of a door switch which needs to be ordered and takes 1 days (24 hours) to repair but all 32 items in the unit are operational.

a. 10.2 Calculations – 1 days of downtime and counted against uptime?

Example 2:

1. One single Transfer Cart (item 06) of the four carts needs service for a failure of a clip to connect to the washer disinfector which needs to be ordered and takes 3 days (36 hours) to repair but all 32 other items in the unit are operational.

a. 10.2 Calculations – 3 days of downtime and counted against uptime?

Example 3:

What if it is user error that causes the issue but it takes multiple days to troubleshoot?

Example 4:

What if it is a utility issue that is external to the Mobile that causes the issue such as low water pressure in the morning that causes the equipment to alarm intermittently and triggering service calls?

Example 5:

What if one single data port out of the 20+ is faulty and needs repair but the rest of the unit and the equipment is operational but the contractor cannot fix it while the unit is in operation and is forced to wait until the weekend (4 days later) to perform the service.

a. Does this count as 4 days of downtime even though all the other equipment is operational?

Government Response Question 3

Reference PWS paragraph 10.2. which states: Also, minor failures with ancillary components which do not affect system availability shall not be considered in determining downtime.

Ancillary components are not considered (I.e.: phone jacks, carts, sinks, data ports) in determining equipment uptime, which is calculated by the actual sterilization equipment systems (washers, sterilizer, ultrasonic cleaner).

If user error or incoming utilities were to be found as reason for equipment failure, since the issue was due to USG-caused reasons (or factors the USG is responsible to provide) and not the fault of the vendor, those days obviously would not be considered in uptime calculations.

Question 4:

Reference PWS paragraph 10.2.1. Service Completion Date: The date and hour the COR accepts the work as completed and signs the Contractor’s service report.

Combine with the above section 10.2 concepts. Is it the intent to count all time from when the contractor would consider the repair to be completed to the date the COR signs as being part of the downtime calculation:

Example 1:

The contractor repairs the sterilizer in 24 hours, but the COR does not sign for it for 48 hours:

Is it considered down for 24 hours or 48 hours?

Government Response Question 4

Downtime calculation is from when the time the sterilization system was called in for repair to when it was restored to full capability. E.g.: sterilizer was called in at 1200 on 23 Dec 24, vendor responded in 4 hours to assess, and parts were ordered. Parts were received on 1200 24 Dec 24. Vendor installed parts by 1600 on 24 Dec 24 and system is now fully functional.

Since business hours of operation for the SPU is 0630 - 2030, the total time the system was down as follows: from 1200 to 2030 on 23 Dec (10.5 hrs) and was down from 0630 - 1600 on 24 Dec to fully operational (9.5 hrs), total downtime was 20 hrs until the system was restored.

For the sterilization systems on 95% uptime, if there are 14 hours in a business day (0630 - 2030) for 6 days a week, and for Dec there are 25 business days, that is 350 hours of uptime per system (2 sterilizers, 2 washers, 1 ultrasonic cleaner, and 1 low temp sterilizer) or 2100 hrs total uptime a month.

95% total uptime for Dec is 1995 hours. The repair above took 20 hours, so they are still above 95% with 2080 hours for equipment uptime for month of Dec. Therefore, no deficiency in contractor performance would be noted.