After-Hours Support Services for Pre-Trip Notification System (PTNS)

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration seeks after-hours call-handling and trip notification support services for the Pre-Trip Notification System (PTNS) serving NOAA Fisheries Northeast Fisheries Science Center, with proposals due July 8 and questions due June 30. The procurement is set-aside for small business concerns under NAICS 561421, Telephone Answering Services.

Place of performance is Woods Hole, Falmouth, Massachusetts. The contractor must provide 24/7/365 live answering service outside standard business hours (5:01 PM to 7:59 AM EST on weekdays and all-day weekends and federal holidays) with a capacity for 27 simultaneous inbound calls, maximum hold time under one minute, and zero dropped calls. Call volume averages approximately 550 minutes monthly, with seasonal peaks during March–April (scallop season), July and October (herring), and summer and holidays (groundfish). The contractor enters trip notification data directly into PTNS during calls, handles trip edits and technical troubleshooting, verifies the mandatory 48-hour pre-departure notification requirement, and escalates urgent situations through a 10-minute emergency contact rotation. All calls must be documented and reported twice daily; comprehensive monthly summaries are due by the last Friday of each month. Performance standards require answering 100% of calls within one minute, entering 100% of notifications within one hour with no more than 2% error rate in critical fields, and resolving greater than 95% of calls without transfers, second calls, or return calls.

The base period runs July 27, 2026 through July 26, 2027, with four optional one-year extensions extending through July 26, 2031. The contract uses a hybrid structure: firm-fixed-price for 2,000 minutes per month and time-and-materials surge support for up to 200 additional minutes monthly, with monthly T&M ceilings ranging from $1,800 to $2,025.92 across base and option years. The incumbent contractor is Metropolitan Communication Services. Personnel must hold a minimum associate's degree (bachelor's preferred), possess excellent verbal communication and customer service skills, hold current Microsoft Office proficiency, and complete required NOAA training in IT security, sexual assault and harassment prevention, records management, and artificial intelligence. All staff must sign non-disclosure agreements before system access. Evaluation considers non-price factors significantly more important than price.