GUIDELINES FOR EVALUATION OF PROPOSALS

<RFP Number>

<RFP Title>

This document is intended as general guidelines to the Request for Proposals (RFP) evaluation committee. As these are general guidelines, changes can apply. All Offerors must be treated fairly and consistently.

Throughout the proposal evaluation process, Evaluation Committee members shall not contact any Offeror or reveal any information or tentative conclusions of the relative merits of the proposal(s). Results of the evaluation process are not public information until AFTER AWARD.

  1. GENERAL
  2. EVALUATION CRITERIA: Proposals shall be initially evaluated by the VCCS using the following criteria:

Evaluation Criteria / Weight[KG1]
Offeror’s Strategy and Methods / 30
Offeror’s Experience and Qualifications / 25
Offeror’s Time Line / 10
Proposed Price / 15
Small Business Subcontracting Plan / 20
TOTAL / 100
  1. SCORING RUBRIC: [KG2]The Proposed Price and the Small Business Subcontracting Plan evaluation will be completed by the contract officer using a mathematical formula (see 4.c and Appendix I). For the other evaluation criteria evaluators should refer to the rubrics below when assignment points for each criterion.

Rating Scale (30 points max)
Description / Point Range
None. Not addressed or response of no value / 0
Poor. Limited alignment to VCCS needs. / 1-4
Fair. Some alignment to VCCS needs. / 5-15
Good. Substantial alignment to VCCS needs. / 16-26
Excellent. Near total alignment to VCCS needs. / 27-30
RatingScale (25 points max)
Description / Point Range
None. Not addressed or response of no value / 0
Poor. Limited alignment to VCCS needs. / 1-3
Fair. Some alignment to VCCS needs. / 4-12
Good. Substantial alignment to VCCS needs. / 13-21
Excellent. Near total alignment to VCCS needs. / 22-25
Location (max point value 20)
Description / Point Range
Any other area / 0-5
Adjacent to Preferred Region / 6-10
Within Preferred Region / 11-15
Within Host College area / 16-20
RatingScale (20 points max)
Description / Point Range
None. Not addressed or response of no value / 0
Poor. Limited alignment to VCCS needs. / 1-3
Fair. Some alignment to VCCS needs. / 4-9
Good. Substantial alignment to VCCS needs. / 10-15
Excellent. Near total alignment to VCCS needs. / 15-20
RatingScale (15 points max)
Description / Point Range
None. Not addressed or response of no value / 0
Poor. Limited alignment to VCCS needs. / 1-3
Fair. Some alignment to VCCS needs. / 4-7
Good. Substantial alignment to VCCS needs. / 8-11
Excellent. Near total alignment to VCCS needs. / 12-15
RatingScale (10 points max)
Description / Point Range
None. Not addressed or response of no value / 0
Poor. Limited alignment to VCCS needs. / 1-2
Fair. Some alignment to VCCS needs. / 3-5
Good. Substantial alignment to VCCS needs. / 6-8
Excellent. Near total alignment to VCCS needs. / 9-10
RatingScale (5 points max)
Description / Point Range
None. Not addressed or response of no value / 0
Poor. Limited alignment to VCCS needs. / 1
Fair. Some alignment to VCCS needs. / 2-3
Good. Substantial alignment to VCCS needs. / 4
Excellent. Near total alignment to VCCS needs. / 5
  1. AWARD: [KG3]Selection shall be made of two or more offerors deemed to be fully qualified and best suited among those submitting proposals on the basis of the evaluation factors included in the Request for Proposals, including price, if so stated in the Request for Proposals. Negotiations shall be conducted with the offerors so selected. Price shall be considered, but need not be the sole determining factor. After negotiations have been conducted with each offeror so selected, the agency shall select the offeror which, in its opinion, has made the best proposal, and shall award the contract to that offeror. The Commonwealth may cancel this Request for Proposals or reject proposals at any time prior to an award, and is not required to furnish a statement of the reasons why a particular proposal was not deemed to be the most advantageous (Code of Virginia, § 2.2-4359D). Should the Commonwealth determine in writing and in its sole discretion that only one offeror is fully qualified, or that one offeror is clearly more highly qualified than the others under consideration, a contract may be negotiated and awarded to that offeror. The award document will be a contract incorporating by reference all the requirements, terms and conditions of the solicitation and the contractor’s proposal as negotiated.
  2. RECEIPT OF PROPOSALS
  3. Proposals will be received and processed by the Purchasing Office.
  4. Any late proposals shall be rejected
  5. The Contract Officer will perform preliminary check-in tasks to ensure that signed originals, proposal copies and other required portions of the offer are included in each proposal.
  6. The Contract Officer reserves the right to waive informalities, minor defects or variations of any proposal from the exact Request for Proposals, which do not affect the price, quality, quantity, or delivery schedule for the goods, services orconstruction being procured (Code of Virginia, § 2.2-4301).
  7. Proposals that are substantially incomplete or fail to meet mandatory requirements may be rejected by the Contract Officer. The decision to eliminate any Offeror from further consideration may be deferred until later in the evaluation process.
  8. After completing the preliminary review, the Contract Officer will forward copies of each proposal and any additional materials received to the Evaluation Committee Members.
  1. PRELIMINARY INDIVIDUAL EVALUATION
  2. Evaluation Committee Members will individually and independently (without discussion with other committee members) review each proposal and be prepared to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of each proposal. Committee members should note any areas of apparent noncompliance and any areas needing clarification for each proposal in relationship to the requirements set forth in the RFP.
  3. Using the Preliminary Individual Evaluation sheets provided by the Contract Officer, Evaluation Committee Members will assign a numerical score, for each evaluation criteria stated in the RFP excluding criteria for Proposed Price and Small Business Subcontracting Plan. Evaluation Committee Members should use the rubric(s) provided in section 1.b of this document to assign a numerical score for those criteria. The Evaluation Committee Members should also provide comments as to the rationale which resulted in the numerical rating for each criterion. The evaluation sheet may also questions to consider for evaluating each criteria and an area for any additional notes. It is very important that there is sufficient documentation for explaining how and why the scores were derived. This documentation should be able to defend the evaluation decisions if questioned. Any viewer of the file, even years later, should be able to review the documentation and be able to determine the basis of the evaluation decisions.
  4. The Contract Officer will review the Proposed Pricing Schedule and Small Business Subcontracting Plansections of the proposals, and willcalculate the scores based on formula. The Contract Officer will provide these scores to the committee. See Appendix I for details of the Proposed Pricing Schedule and Small Business Participationevaluation points calculation.
  1. CONSENSUS EVALUATION
  2. After the Contract Officer has determined that Preliminary Individual Evaluationshave been completed by each member, the Evaluation Committee will meet in person or via telephone, email, or other means to complete a consensus evaluation used to determine which offerors will be selected for negotiation.Multiple meetings may be necessary to complete the consensus evaluation.
  3. In an open, but organized manner, the Evaluation Committee should discuss the Preliminary Individual Evaluations. Discussions are required particularly whenever there is inconsistency in the ratings of the evaluation committee members, or there is a disparity in the ratings for particular criteria for the same Offeror.
  4. The Evaluation Committee shouldmake a determination as to the need for Oral Presentations or submission of clarifying information. Oral presentations are not mandatory and may be conducted when clarifying information cannot be secured by other means. Oral presentations may be conducted in person, via the web or other means.
  5. Required clarifying or additional information should be secured in writing. If discussed orally, the Offeror should follow-up by providing the clarification in writing.
  6. Oral presentation may be held with none, any or all of the Offerors. If oral presentations are requested, or additional information is obtained that impacts ratings, the panel may choose to re-rate the Preliminary Individual Evaluationsor may choose to reflect those changes in the Consensus Evaluation.
  7. Oral presentations are limited to clarification or verification of the Offeror's written proposal. Negotiations are not conducted at this point.
  8. After clarifying information has been provided by one of the methods described above, the Evaluation Committee may reassess their Preliminary Individual Evaluation. Any changes from the previous rating should be explained. Skip this step if re-rating is not required.
  9. The Evaluation Committee will complete a ConsensusEvaluation sheet.
  10. The evaluation committee will create a “short-list” for negotiating by selectingthe Offerors with whom to negotiate based on the ratings of the Consensus Evaluation.
  11. Discuss each short-listed Offeror's proposal, in detail, and develop a list of negotiation points.
  1. NEGOTIATIONS
  2. The Contract Officer will coordinate the negotiation process, and in conjunction with the evaluation committee formulate a negotiation strategy and agenda.
  3. Negotiations may be conducted in person, via web, teleconference or any other appropriate mean.
  4. Negotiations should be conducted in accordance with the planned negotiation strategies and agenda. Multiple negotiation sessions may be required or allowed as necessary.
  5. Each Offeror, with whom negotiations were conducted, will be required to submit written confirmation of any negotiated changes to the original proposal.
  6. The VCCS may suspend or discontinue the negotiation with any offeror at any time the process.
  7. The VCCS may choose to expand the short-list and negotiate with additional offerorsdeemed to be fully qualified and best suited among those submitting proposals at any time during the negotiation process.
  1. AWARD DECISION
  2. Through the negotiation process, the VCCS shall select the offeror which, in its opinion, has made the best proposal, and may award a contract to that offeror.
  3. The Contract Officer typically prepares and posts the award notice. After award, the procurement file is a public document, available for review by anyone who so desires.

Appendix I

Evaluation Points Calculations for Proposed Pricing Schedule and Small Business Subcontracting Plan

The following are guidelines for calculating the points awarded for the Proposed Pricing Schedule and Small Business Subcontracting Plan evaluation criteria.

Proposed Pricing Schedule Points:

The contracting officer will review the offerors’ proposed pricing schedule and determine the Estimated Total Price for the project.

Proposed price for any optional services shall not be included in the price scoring, for shortlisting however they may be considered during negotiation.

The lowest Estimated Total Price shall be scored the maximum number of points available for the Proposed Pricing Schedule criterion.

The lowest Estimated Total Priceis then divided by each of the higher priced offeror’s Estimated Total Price in turn. The quotient is then multiplied by the maximum points for price to determine the evaluation points to be assigned to each higher price proposal.

Small Business Subcontracting Plan:

When assigning points for the Small Business Subcontracting Plan criterion, a DSBSD-certified small business,who serves as the prime contractor, will receive the maximum number of evaluation points for this criterion.

Other businesses that are not DSBSD-certified small businesses will receive credit based on their Small Business Subcontracting Plan not to exceed 75% of the maximum to this evaluation criterion (i.e. 20 points X 75%=

15 points.) Points will be assigned based on each offeror’s proposed subcontracting expenditures with DMBE-certified small businesses for the initial contract period as indicated in the offeror’s submitted subcontractingplan in relation to each offeror’s Estimated Total Price. The Offeror’s proposed subcontractor use of DMBE certified small businesses is divided by the Offeror’s Estimated Total Price. The quotient is then multiplied by 75% of the maximum points assigned for the criteria to determine the evaluation points to be assigned to that offeror for the criterion.

[KG1]Modify as evaluation criteria as needed

[KG2]Modify scoring rubric as needed

[KG3]Select and appropriate award clause