FY20 - FDES - New Contract, Direct and Bulk Mailing

The State of Michigan Department of Treasury issued Request for Proposal 200000001072 on May 4, 2020, seeking a contractor to provide address updating, direct mailing fulfillment, and bulk distribution services for state income tax forms. The procurement requires the contractor to process approximately 4.5 million taxpayer addresses through the Coding Accuracy Support System (CASS) or similar application, provide direct mailing fulfillment services for three tax booklets (MI1040 Book estimated at 75,000 copies, MI1040 CR7 Book at 240,000 copies, and City Corp Book at 4,000 copies), and deliver bulk distribution services to 1,004 distribution sites across Michigan. Pricing proposals must be submitted in modifiable format and include all costs associated with address updating services (NCOA, CASS, DSF), presort and addressing, direct mailing, bulk distribution fulfillment, storage, shipping, database programming, and postage, with contractors encouraged to provide quick payment term discounts. Evaluation criteria weight technical capabilities at 95 points, comprising 70 points for service capabilities, 20 points for Michigan experience, and 5 points for other vendor qualifications, with a minimum score of 80 points required to advance to price evaluation. Bidders' questions were due by May 11, 2020, with answers posted by May 15, 2020, and proposals were due by June 4, 2020 at 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time. The anticipated contract start date is September 1, 2020, with an initial term through August 31, 2023, renewable for up to two additional one-year periods at the State's discretion. An addendum issued on June 4, 2020 required bidders to email proposal documents or proof of submission to zanettia@michigan.gov to mitigate technical issues with the SIGMA VSS submission system.

The RFP does not specify set-aside designations or restrictions on the types of organizations eligible to respond. All bidders must complete a Confidential Treatment Form, provide proof of quality assurance procedures, and comply with extensive safeguard requirements for handling confidential tax information, including annual security compliance certification and physical security controls for data storage and transmission. The contract includes liquidated damages of $5,000 plus $100 per day for late or improper completion and service level charges of $100 per business day for failure to submit the Certificate of Destruction by the fifth business day deadline. No incumbent vendor or current contractor information is provided in the solicitation documents. The RFP does not disclose a specific budget range or estimated award value; however, the scope of services—processing 4.5 million addresses, printing and fulfilling approximately 319,000 tax booklets, and distributing materials to over 1,000 sites statewide—suggests a substantial contract requiring significant operational capacity and infrastructure.