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contractor100

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  1. These cases don't seem on point to me, please tell me what I am missing. My RFP says the FC is required for performance. Not for award, and not before proposal submission, as in the cases above. The idea is that, if my company won, we could then secure the FC. (This is not my idea. This is my boss's idea. The question isn't whether it's a good strategy, it's whether it's possible.) So to restate my questions, with a little more info: 1 The first block of the DD-254 says, "level of security clearance required - secret." The RFP requires me to submit the DD-254 with the proposal. If I put my company's name and address on that form, put in the Cognizant Security Office for my address,and submit, I am not representing that I have an FC - do you agree? 2 In the unlikely event my company is awarded this work it would be the only company on the contract. No subs, no prime. The awarding agency (GCA) has stated they will not sponsor clearances. So can any cleared company sponsor my company, once we've established the need for a clearance by being awarded a contract that requires an FC? I always thought the sponsoring cleared company had to been awarded the justifying contract or a subcontract against the contract, but that does not appear to be what the NISPOM says: "A contractor or prospective contractor cannot apply for its own FCL. A GCA or a currently cleared contractor may sponsor an uncleared company for an FCL. A company must meet the following eligibility requirements before it can be processed for an FCL: a. The company must need access to the classified information in connection with a legitimate U.S. Government or foreign government requirement. b. The company must be organized and existing under the laws of any of the fifty states, the District of Columbia, or Puerto Rico, and be located in the United States or its territorial areas.c. The company must have a reputation for integrity and lawful conduct in its business dealings. The company and its key managers must not be barred from participating in U.S. Government contracts. d. The company must not be under FOCI to such a degree that the granting of the FCL would be inconsistent with the national interest." Chapter 2. https://www.esd.whs.mil/Portals/54/Documents/DD/issuances/dodm/522022M.pdf
  2. The government agency issuing an RFP has stated they won't sponsor bidders for a clearance. They've also said the facility clearance is required for performance. They have not said a clearance needs to be in place on proposal submission. They have included a DD-254 in the bid package and are requiring contractors to submit the DD-254 with the proposal, with contractors name, address, zip code, cage code, and cognizant security office. We do not have a facility security clearance. Questions: 1 May I submit the DD-254 with the cognizant security office that would be assigned to my company if I had a facility clearance? 2 If I were to be awarded the work, can I be sponsored by another cleared agency even if that agency has no connection to the contract, in other words, was not a prime or a sub on the contract? Thanks for any help!
  3. several on line authorities seem to say that: 1 "all commercial customers" as a GSA BOA includes all customers that are not federal, unless those classes of customers are explicitly excluded - so would cover educational, not for profit, state and local 2 "all commercial customers" as a GSA BOA includes state and local customers unless state and local customers are explicitly excluded 3 "all commercial customers" as a GSA BOA includes state and local customers and state and local customers cannot be excluded (like sales to prime) Does anyone have an opinion, experience, or actual documentation on this? Thanks in advance
  4. Are you asking if you can award a schedule holder a task order for a labor category that hasn't been added to their GSA schedule?
  5. That is useful to know. By decent, you mean reasonably highly scored against the eval criteria?
  6. 80 percent! That is an interesting number! Yes, PepeFrog, that is a good question.
  7. Some contractors issue a lot of proposals, even if they know nothing about a particular RFP and they are not specifically qualified to do the work. I've heard the following reasons advanced: 1. Companies that are quite unqualified win work all the time. We really have no idea how the government picks winners. We could get lucky too. (The "lottery ticket" theory of bid qualification.) 2. We can't tell what the government wants from reading the RFP. We'll tell them they want to buy what we sell, and they will see we are right and give us the work. (The "magical thinking" theory of bid qualification.) 3. Even if we know we won't win, if our proposal is beautifully written and designed, we will leave a good impression on the reviewers' minds, and they will remember us favorably when we submit a proposal for which we are better qualified (The "birthday card" theory of bid qualification.) Those of you that regularly review proposals - what's your opinion of the last idea?
  8. And another thing. why is any federal RFP, ever, issued with no page numbers.
  9. Is google currently contracting directly with the federal government? Around the time OFCCP went after them for pay records, they terminated their GSA schedule. (I think DoL's appeal of the ALJ's decision is still under appeal, but I don't know, maybe someone else does. (see https://www.governmentcontractorcomplianceupdate.com/2017/09/06/department-of-labor-challenges-aljs-decision-on-googles-obligation-to-respond-to-ofccp-data-requests/).
  10. Where did I say the government was being a pain? I am trying to figure out how to respond to the government's request. As I can also change my technical offering, what does it mean to evaluate the delta. Since the final price will be for a different service offering.
  11. But contractors can change their prices!! So, what is the value of getting the price quotes now?
  12. I am doing that right now, thanks for the suggestion! Why ask for something that is a. not binding and b. you are not going to evaluate.
  13. Hard to say. They say the purpose of the oral presentation is "to address unanswered/unclear aspects of the submitted quote" So that sounds just like clarification. Possibly they just mean that bidders can revise their written proposals to be consonant with the clarifications, I don't know.
  14. 8.4 procurement. RFP states 1. It is best value 2. Five eval factors, plus price. a Understanding the requirement b Key personnel c Corporate experience d Quality control plan e Oral presentation 3. It is two phases. In phase 1, they'll evaluate whether proposals are technically acceptable for a-d. They'll kick out the unacceptable proposals. Then they'll invite everyone else to make an oral presentation. Then they'll do a best value analysis on a through e. Contractors may revise their proposals after the oral presentations. Why are they even asking for price in phase 1?
  15. "Offerors, not sure what agencies were looking for, resorted to what I call "recon by fire," an old infantry tactic. They wrote as much as they could about everything they could, hoping to score enough points to get into discussions, ..." This is so right. Happy to see more OASIS-style procurements.
  16. Napolik/Socrates - Honestly, in cases where ten pages are, truly, insufficient to address a long and complex statement of work, I am not sure what their purpose is! In a competition open to all comers, I'd say it was to eliminate clearly insane responses--kind of like establishing a technical range. Is that necessary though? You'd have to think most schedule contractors can write something reasonably germane - and there should be a lot fewer responses, especially where the RFQ only went to three bidders. I have submitted at least 350 responses to GSA RFQs and been awarded a task order in maybe a third? I have never, not once, had any discussions with a CO or anyone else about a solution/technical approach. Maybe in ten percent of cases I've had the opportunity to revise the price - without revising the technical. Don, we are offering the solution after we have been awarded the contract. So how was a "technical approach" evaluated - made the basis of a decision? Desperado you are totally right. Sometimes ten pages is enough. But, sometimes, it is only enough to say "we will comply with the specifications" in various fancy ways. Any bidder can do that! Where's the evaluation?
  17. Hey Kevlar51, thanks for that DKW case. Hilarious! Note that GAO said it was just fine to: includ[e] large tables that address substantive matters, using a 10-point font size. People do this! A lot! I would prohibit it if I were writing an RFP.
  18. Okay, Napolik, it does not. Because it is an RFQ. I have submitted at least 350 responses to GSA RFQs. I have never, not once, had any post submission discussions or whatever they are called on GSA procurements. Has anyone else? I've had plenty post award! Where we actually determined what work we would do.
  19. Thanks for the case, policyguy - but I think most contractors understand that they can be thrown out for not following directions. Would love to see a protest that page limitations made it impossible to meaningfully evaluate offers - that's the issue, really. And, per Napolik, make it impossible for the government and the contractor to enter into a contract under which the contractor has an obligation to offer a specific solution, see 2. above. yes, the responses are RFQs, not RFPs. that is just an odd artefact of the GSA schedules. Commercial or not, contractors should have to offer some specific solution! Of course, this complaint is very fact specific. Yes, there are plenty of solicitations where ten pages is quite enough, despite the length of the SOW. Believe me, shorter proposals save us money. Even cutting and pasting reams of boilerplate has costs to contractors. Ten pages is cheaper, even where we have to put some thought (!!) into writing them. But there are solicitations where ten pages just isn't enough and we really fail to see how the government can get the information it needs to compare offers or to enter into a contract under which the government can get what it needs without a ton of mods. So, dark suspicions of the government's "real" goal in limiting the proposal, and yes, jewettr, of course people constantly speculate that page limitations mean the RFP's aimed at a particular contractor.
  20. Agree with you on some of these points, Desperado, but not all. First, none of these were LPTA solicitations! They were best value, with the technical approach weighted most heavily. "...all we really need to know is that your company has a sound technical approach" The "specs" to which I refer are an SOW, listing 50 pages worth of outcomes the government wants from certain professional services. The issue is: If the government's technical requirements ("specs") take 50 pages, how can contractors explain how they will meet those requirements in 10 pages? Many people feel that is impossible, hence the cynicism of some of the theories proposed. "Remove the fluff and tell us how you're going to do this task order." Can we, in only 10 pages? That is the issue. Yes, there is a lot of horrible gasbag writing in proposals and I am sorry for anyone that has to read it. But the 10-page limit is kind of a blunt instrument to solve the problem. How about marking people down for bloviating instead? "I would think that perhaps they do have an idea of what they want and how they want it done, within the variance as defined by the technical approach of the offerors." Well that's the point. Can they determine which, if any, contractor can give them what they want, how they want it, with these extreme page limitations?
  21. Or the risk of a pre-award protest. Contractors have to protest “alleged improprieties in a solicitation that are apparent prior to the closing time for receipt to proposals" before the proposal due date - so if a contracting officer will not clarify an RFP, contractors have a strong incentive to protest.
  22. Everyone was sitting around chatting about the most recent RFQ to cross our desks which: Stated it was "best value" solicitation, with technical the most important of the factors Had a 50+ page SOW, with fairly elaborate specifications Limited the technical approach to 10 pages, 12 point type, one inch margins, double space, "graphics may contain 10 point type" Fixed price quote. Stated "may award without discussions." We have seen at last 15 such RFQs this year, from quite a few different agencies and contracting shops. All RFQs have been task orders on GSA schedules. Some were on ebuy, some were directed to a specific group of contractors. Anyone care to share opinions on why such RFPs are released? Proposals from my colleagues: 1. So what if the specs are five times longer than the pages allowed to address them? There is no connection between detail in specifications and number of words in the technical approach. We should be able to explain how we will do this work at a general, high level in ten pages, and there is no reason that is not sufficient to make an award. 2. This is an RFQ. Our proposal will not be incorporated into the contract. The government does not understand what it wants to buy and does not want to get tied down to a specific solution. They are trying to avoid contractors' getting too specific, so that they can determine what they actually want to buy after an award has been made. Any problems with the pricing can be cured with modifications. This is "commercial practice." 3. Because we are on GSA schedule, they already know we know how to do the work, so we should not need to explain how to do the work in this specific instance. 4. The government actually wants to run an LPTA competition, but people complain about LPTA competitions. People make jokes about John Glenn/Alan Shepard and rockets built from lowest priced parts. So by making contractors' technical approaches meaningless and therefore impossible to compare, the contract can be awarded on price -- without calling it LPTA. 5. The contracting office is sick of reading corporate proposal boilerplate. 10 pages, 50 pages, 100 pages - it's all equally useless and unpleasant to read. They are just trying to cut down on time and human suffering. 6. The contracting office is only kidding: let's just put all of our text into boxes with ten point type, make the text double column, and fix the leading so we can get twice as many words on the page!
  23. Wasn't questioning whether VA is required to give first priority to the named groups in the order listed in the statute. Of course they do. Was questioning whether this statute is specific authorization to use a cascading procurement, per the SBA reg. Perhaps 8127 only means that the preferences must be applied in order to select which category to set aside a procurement for.
  24. Sorry, our emails crossed. Still don't see how that's an authorization. I don't see an explicit authorization in the VA supplement, not like the one in the DFARS. 215.203-70 Requests for proposals – tiered evaluation of offers. (a) The tiered or cascading order of precedence used for tiered evaluation of offers shall be consistent with FAR Part 19. (b) Consideration shall be given to the tiers of small businesses (e.g., 8(a), HUBZone small business, service-disabled veteran-owned small business, small business) before evaluating offers from other than small business concerns. (c) The contracting officer is prohibited from issuing a solicitation with a tiered evaluation of offers unless— (1) The contracting officer conducts market research, in accordance with FAR Part 10 and Part 210, to determine— (i) Whether the criteria in FAR Part 19 are met for setting aside the acquisition for small business; or (ii) For a task or delivery order, whether there are a sufficient number of qualified small business concerns available to justify limiting competition under the terms of the contract; and (2) If the contracting officer cannot determine whether the criteria in paragraph (c)(1) of this section are met, the contracting officer includes a written explanation in the contract file as to why such a determination could not be made (Section 816 of Pub. L. 109-163).
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