Request for proposals for the design, configuration and implementation of an in- house contact centre solution /system that provides business intelligence information of the Department of Home Affairs core systems.

Tender number: RFP: DHA01-2015

Due Date: 20 March 2015

Invitation to Bid/Tender

Tender Number / RFP:DHA01--2015
Brief Description of Tender / Request for proposals for the design, configuration and implementation of an in-house contact centre solution /system that provides business intelligence information of the Department of Home Affairs core systems.
Closing and time of bids / 20 March 2015
11:00
Bid Documents may be posted to: / Chief Director
Contract Management
Private Bag X49
PRETORIA
0001
Bid documents may also be deposited in the bid box situated at: / National Treasury
240 Madiba (Vermeulen)Street between ABSA and the Salzburg Restaurant
*Bidders should ensure that bids are delivered on time to the correct address. No late bids will be accepted.
Address for communication / Department of Home Affairs
Head Office Procurement
Bid related enquiries should be directed to:
Email:
Technical enquiries should be directed to:
E-mail:

I Instructions to Bidders

THE TENDER DOCUMENTS

1.1Rules for Bidding

PROPOSAL REQUEST

Responses to this RFP [hereinafter referred to as a Bid or a Proposal] are requested from persons, companies, close corporations or enterprises for the provision of an in-house contact centre solution/system that provides business intelligence information of the Department of Home Affairs core systems.

Rules for Proposals

The Department is not bound to accept any of the proposals submitted and reserves the right to call for presentations from short-listed respondents before concluding on the proposals.

The Department reserves the right not to go on tender or to appoint any service provider after receiving and evaluating the proposals.

The service provider [who is the respondent to the RFP] must be a single legal entity with all other necessary expertise secured via sub-contract, or under a joint venture arrangement.

The proposing entity shall be the same entity that will execute the bid. Any proposal found to be fronting for another entity or entities shall be disqualified immediately.

All South African firms submitting proposals as part of a consortium or joint venture must submit original tax clearance certificates valid for at least six months after the closing date of this request.

Foreign firms providing proposals must become familiar with local conditions and laws and take them into account in preparing their proposals.

Firms may ask for clarification on these tender documents or any part thereof up to close of business 1 week before the deadline for the submission of the bids.

The Department reserves the right to return late proposal submissions unopened.

Firms may not contact the Department on any matter pertaining to their proposal from the time when the proposal are submitted to the time a decision is taken by the Accounting Officer on the appointment of a service provider.

Conditions of the RFP

DHA expressly reserves its rights, in its sole discretion to:

Accept or reject any Proposal;

Accept or reject individual items in a Proposal;

Request clarification or further information regarding any item in the Proposal

Consider such alternate goods, services, terms or conditions that may be offered, whether such offer is contained in a Proposal or otherwise.

Cost of the Proposal

The proposing entity shall bear all costs associated with the preparation and submission of its proposal and the Department, will in no case be held responsible or liable for these costs, regardless of the conduct or outcome of the process.

Content of Proposal Documents

The services required, proposal procedures and contract terms are prescribed in the below documents, which include:

Instruction to bidders/ proposers;

Terms of Reference;

Evaluation Criterion;

Standard Conditions of Contract;

Technical Bid;

Financial Bid;

The Bidder is expected to examine all instructions, forms, terms and specifications in the proposal documents. Failure to furnish all information required by the proposal documents or submission of a proposal not responsive to the proposal documents in every respect will be at the Bidder’s risk and may result in rejection of the proposal.

Clarification of Proposal Documents

The Department will respond

onemail to any request for clarification of the tender documents which it receives no later than 1 week prior to the deadline for submission of bids prescribed by the Department.

 All entities who submitted proposals are invited to attend a compulsory briefing session that will be held as follows :

  • Date: 06 March 2015
  • Venue: Hallmark Building, 230 Johannes Ramokgoase Street (old Proes Street), Pretoria
  • Time: 10:00am

-The Department will respond in email to any request for clarification of the tender documents which it receives no later than 1 week prior to the deadline for submission of bids prescribed by the Department

Amendment of Proposal Documents

At any time prior to the deadline for submission of proposals, the Department may, for any reason, whether at its own initiative or in response to a clarification requested by any company/ entity, modify the proposal document by amendment.

All bidders who have received the proposal document will be notified of the amendment in writing or by fax, and same will be binding on them.

In order to allow companies reasonable time in which to take the amendment into account in preparing their proposals, the Department, at their discretion, may extend the deadline for the submission of proposals.

1.2Conditions

1.1. The General Conditions of contract, as stipulated in the GCC, will apply.

1.2.The Department will become the owner of all information, documents, programmes, advice and reports collected and compiled by the service provider in the execution of this tender.

1.3.The copyright of all documents, programmes, and reports compiled by the service provider will vest in the Department and may not be reproduced or distributed or made available in any other way without the written consent of the Department.

1.4.All information, documents, programmes and reports must be regarded as confidential and may not be made available to any unauthorised person or institution without the written consent of the Department.

1.5.Bidders shall undertake to limit the number of copies of this document and destroy them in the event of their failure to secure the contract.

1.6.The service provider is entitled to general knowledge acquired in the execution of this agreement and may use it, provided that it shall not be to the detriment of the Department.

B.PREPARATION OF PROPOSALS

1.3Language of Bid

1.1.The proposal prepared by the Bidder, as well as all correspondence and documents relating to the bid exchanged by the Bidder and the Department shall be written in English.

1.4Documents Constituting the Bid

1.2.The proposal prepared by the Bidder shall comprise the following components:

  1. Technical Bid, including:
  2. Invitation to Bid
  3. Original Tax Clearance Certificate
  4. Bid Form
  5. Declaration of Interests(SBD4)
  6. Declaration of past Supply Chain Management practices (SBD8)
  7. Preferential Points Claim Forms (As applicable)
  8. Certificate of independent bid determination (SBD9)
  9. General Conditions of contract
  10. Completed Technical Specification Document
  11. Financial Bid, comprising:
  12. Bid Form
  13. SBD 3.1 Price Schedule
  14. Financial proposal

1.5Bid Prices

1.3.Prices indicated on the Price Schedule shall be the total price of goods or services including, where applicable:

  1. All duties and other taxes;
  2. The price of transportation, insurance and other costs incidental to delivery of the goods or services to their final destination;
  3. The price of any other incidental services required in terms of the tender deliverables;

1.4.Prices quoted by the Bidder shall be fixed during the Bidder’s performance of the Contract and not subject to variation on any account.

1.5.A proposal submitted with a variable price quotation will be treated as non-responsive and rejected.

1.6.Prices shall be quoted in South African Rands.

1.7.The Department has limited resources and bids must be competitive, with market related pricing, as this will be one of the deciding factors in the final award of the contract.

1.6Period of Validity of Bids

1.8.Bids shall remain valid for 90 days after the closing date of bid prescribed by the Department. A bid valid for a shorter period shall be rejected by the Department as non-responsive.

1.9.In exceptional circumstances, the Department may solicit the Bidder’s consent to an extension of the period of validity. The request and the response thereto shall be made in writing. A Bidder may refuse the request. A Bidder granting the request will not be required nor permitted to modify its bid.

1.7Format and Signing of Bid

1.10.The Bidder shall prepare two copies of the Technical Bid and Financial Bid separately, clearly marking each "Original Bid" and "Copy Bid", as appropriate. In the event of any discrepancy between them, the original shall govern. Apartfrom hard copies, a copy should also be provided on CD.

1.11.The original and all copies of the bid shall be typed or written in indelible ink and shall be signed by the Bidder or a person or persons duly authorized to bind the Bidder to the Contract. All pages of the bid, except for un-amended printed literature, shall be initialled by the person or persons signing the bid.

1.12.Any interlineations, erasures or overwriting shall be valid only if they are initialled by the person or persons signing the bid.

1.8Sealing and Marking of Bids

1.13.The original and copy of the Technical Bid shall be placed in a sealed envelope clearly marked Technical Bid and original and copy of the Financial Bid shall be placed in a sealed envelope clearly marked Financial Bid and warning "Do not open with Technical Bid". All the inner envelopes shall then be placed into an outer envelope. The inner and outer envelopes shall be addressed to the Department at the following address:

Tender Information Centre

Contract Management

Private Bag X49

PRETORIA

0001

1.14.The inner envelopes shall also indicate the name and address of the Bidder to enable the bid to be returned unopened in case it is declared late.

1.15.If the outer envelope is not sealed and marked as required by the clause 6.2, the Department will assume no responsibility for the bid’s misplacement or premature opening.

1.16.Faxed bids will not be accepted.

1.9Closing Date of Bids

1.17.Bids (Technical and Financial) must be received by the Department at the address specified under clause 6.1. In the event of the specified date for the submission of Bids being declared a holiday for the Department, the Bids will be received up to the appointed time on the next working day.

1.18.The Department may, at its discretion, extend this deadline for submission of bids by amending the bid documents in accordance with clause 13.1, in which case all rights and obligations of the Department and Bidders previously subject to the deadline will thereafter be subject to the deadline as extended.

1.10Late Bids

1.19.Any proposal received by the Department after the deadline for submission of bids prescribed by the Department, will be rejected and/or returned unopened to the Bidder.

1.11Modification and Withdrawal of Bids

1.20.The Bidder may modify or withdraw its bid after the bid’s submission, provided that written notice of the modification or withdrawal is received by the Department prior to the deadline prescribed for submission of bids.

1.21.The Bidder’s modification or withdrawal notice shall be prepared, sealed, marked and dispatched in accordance with the provisions of clause 6. A withdrawal notice may also be sent by fax, followed by a signed confirmation copy, post marked not later than the deadline for submission of bids.

1.22.No proposal may be modified subsequent to the deadline for submission of bids.

1.23.No bid may be withdrawn in the interval between the deadline for submission of bids and the expiration of period of bid validity specified by the Bidder on the bid form.

C.BID OPENING AND EVALUATION OF BIDS

1.12Opening of Technical Bids by the Department

1.1.The bidder’s names, bid modifications or withdrawals and such other details as the Department at its discretion may consider appropriate, will be announced at the opening. No bid shall be rejected at bid opening, except for late bids, which shall be returned unopened to the Bidder pursuant to clause 8 above.

1.2.Bids (and modifications sent pursuant to clause 9 above) that are not opened and read out at bid opening shall not be considered further for evaluation, irrespective of the circumstances.

1.13Opening of Financial Bids

1.3.After the evaluation of Technical Bid, the Department shall notify those Bidders whose Technical Bids were considered non-responsive to the conditions of the Contract and not meeting the Technical Specification indicating that their Financial Bid will not be opened and will be returned unopened after completing the selection process. The notification may be sent by registered letter, facsimile or electronic mail.

1.14Clarification of Bids

1.4.During evaluation of bids, the Department may, at its discretion, ask the Bidder for a clarification of its bid. The request for clarification and the response shall be in writing.

1.15Preliminary Examination

1.5.The Department will examine the bids to determine whether they are complete, whether they meet all the conditions of the Contract and Technical Specifications and whether any computational errors have been made, whether the documents have been properly signed, and whether the bids are generally in order.

1.6.Arithmetical errors will be rectified on the following basis. If there is a discrepancy between the unit price and the total price that is obtained by multiplying the unit price and quantity, the unit price shall prevail and the total price shall be corrected. If there is a discrepancy between words and figures, the amount in words shall prevail. If the supplier does not accept the correction of errors, its bid may be rejected.

1.7.If a bid is not responsive and not fulfilling all the conditions of the Contract and not meeting Technical Specifications it will be rejected by the Department and may not subsequently be made responsive by the Bidder by correction of the non-conformity.

1.16Evaluation and Comparison of Bids

1.8.The Department will evaluate and compare the financial bids only of those Bidders whose Technical Bid has been accepted by the Department.

1.9.The Department’s evaluation of a Financial bid will take into account, in addition to the bid-price (Ex-factory/ex-warehouse/off-the-shelf price) of the goods offered such price to include all costs as well as duties and taxes paid or payable on components and raw material incorporated or to be incorporated in the goods, and Excise duty on the finished goods, if payable) and price of incidental services, the cost of inland transportation, insurance and other costs incidental to the delivery of the goods to their final destination.

1.17Contacting the Department

1.10.Subject to clause 3 above, no Bidder shall contact the Department on any matter relating to its bid, from the time of the bid opening to the time the Contract is awarded. If the bidder wishes to bring additional information to the notice of the Department, it should do so in writing.

1.11.Any effort by a Bidder to influence the Department in its decisions on bid evaluation, bid comparison or contract award may result in rejection of the Bidder’s bid.

D.AWARD OF CONTRACT

1.18Post qualification

1.1.The Department will determine to its satisfaction whether the Bidder that is selected as having submitted the highest evaluated responsive bid meets the criteria specified in these documents, and is qualified to perform the contract satisfactorily.

1.2.The determination will take into account the Bidder’s financial, technical and production capabilities. It will be based upon an examination of the documentary evidence of the Bidder’s qualifications submitted by the bidder, as well as such other information as the Department deems necessary and appropriate.

1.3.An affirmative determination will be a prerequisite for award of the Contract to the Bidder. A negative determination will result in rejection of the Bidder’s bid, in which event the Department will proceed to the next highest evaluated bid to make a similar determination of that Bidder’s capabilities to perform the contract satisfactorily.

1.4.Upon evaluation of the proposals and identification of suitable service providers, the Department would go on a closed tender and then award the contract to the most suitable service provider

1.19Department’s right to vary Quantities at Time of Award

The Department reserves the right at the time of Contract award to increase or decrease the quantity of goods and services originally specified in the Terms of Reference without any change in unit price or other terms and conditions.

1.20Department’s right to accept or reject any or all Bids

1.5.The Department reserves the right to:

  1. Accept or reject any bid;
  2. Annul the tender process and reject all bids at any time prior to contract award;
  3. Award the contract to one or more bidders; without thereby incurring any liability to the affected Bidder or bidders.

1.21Notification of Award

1.6.Prior to the expiration of the period of bid validity, the Department will notify the successful bidder in writing by registered letter or by fax, to be confirmed in writing by registered letter, that its bid has been accepted.

1.7.The notification of award will constitute the formation of the Contract.

1.22Signing of Contract

1.8.At the same time as the Department notifies the successful bidder that its bid has been accepted, the Department will send the bidder the Contract Form provided in the tender documents, incorporating all agreements between the parties.

1.9.Within 21 days of receipt of the Contract Form, the successful bidder shall sign and date the Contract Form and return it to the Department.

C.SCOPE AND EXTENT OF THE TENDER

1.1Objective

The Department of Home Affairs intends to establish an In-house contact centre as part of the broader framework of effectively and efficiently managing customer complaints, compliments, enquiries and queries. It is within this context that the proposals are requested from suitable service providers on the establishment of the contact centre. The respondents to this RFP are requested to provide proposals with project plans and costs for thedelivery of fully fledged, reliable, scalable and adaptable contact centre technology and systems for an in-house contact centre as well as work with DHA in building on the existing systems through innovative solutions that would bring about a more effective and efficient service offering by DHA. The solution should have business intelligence capabilities to integrate with, and run on top of Home Affairs modernization core systems which run on Oracle and Adabas databases with CISCO networks and telephony systems.