FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
BUREAU OF CONTRACTS, GRANTS AND PROCUREMENT
MANAGEMENT SERVICES
325 West Gaines Street
332 Turlington Building
Tallahassee, Florida 32399-0400
ADDENDUM #1
BID NO.: RFI 2014-27
July 26, 2013
Service Desk Support Services
This addendum is being issued to provide the Answers to Questions submitted timely by vendors during the Question and Answers period and to amend the current Schedule of Events of the RFI.
While the Service Desk support will be provided to systems created with RTTT funding, it is important to note that the RTTT grant period ends effective June 30, 2014. The systems to be supported will continue to operate well beyond the scope of RTTT. Funding for this support will not come from the grant.
1. Please explain the types of users who would be contacting the Service Desk. Are these internal employees of the DOE or external customers to the DOE such as school administrators, teachers and students?
Primary users are teachers, students and administrators in all LEAs (counties/school districts) throughout the state of Florida; we do anticipate there will be some calls from students’ parents for certain systems
2. Are the applications and systems to be supported already implemented or will they be implemented soon?
Several are under development and we do not have any baseline data. 3. If these systems and applications already exist:
a. Please provide an overview of the types of applications that are being supported
No 3rd party software or hardware
CPALMS – Common Core database and resource center for teachers, ~15,000 visitors per day, currently 25,000 users, adding ~3,000 accounts per month FAIR/PMRN – screens for kindergarten readiness and assesses reading skills of
eIPEP – electronic institution program evaluation plans; 24 colleges, 12 universities, 29 private institutions; currently ~375 users, expected to increase SSO – single point of entry for multiple systems/programs; ##’s??
b. Please provide the number of monthly inbound contacts for the last 12 months broken out by phone, email, web chat, etc. related to this call center/service desk support
Stats are only available for one system (FAIR/PMRN): app 26 calls per day for the month of June
c. Please provide this monthly so that we can see the “significant fluctuations during peak periods.”
Not available
d. Please explain what is causing the fluctuations in volume during peak periods. Assessment/testing periods, ex: FCAT, beginning of the school year
e. What is the current average process/talk time per inbound contact? Not available
f. Can you please provide a breakdown of calls by hour in order to see how many calls come in during the day/evening/overnight/weekend?
Not available
g. Can you provide the top 20 current call types?
Password reset, log-in issues, student isn’t in system or there are multiple instances of the same student, etc. Varies by system and not all are known at this time as all systems are not yet in production
4. The RFP mentions support for interactions in Spanish and Creole. What is the anticipated number of contacts to be handled in these languages? Also, what specific hours of operation are
anticipated for these languages?
Limited and most likely parents trying to assist a student assignment or explain instructions. Normal business hours and evenings during the week.
5. The RFI asks for a “description of the pricing structure.” Can you please explain if this is to be an overview of the recommended structure or if the Vendor is being asked to provide actual budgetary pricing?
This is an RFI, a recommended structure with cost information for planning is requested. 6. What hours of operation are being requested for Service Desk Support? Is it 24 x 7 x 365 or a
subset of these hours? Also, is holiday support to be provided?
The seven programs are on line so most are assessable 24 x 7 x 365 it is more likely that the normal hours would be from 6:00 AM to 8:00 PM with some evening and weekend work. Most systems contain planning tools for teachers but the Item Bank and Test Platform could have significant student use during the week while students and teachers are in school. Holiday hours are not anticipated as a need at this time.
7. Does the Service Desk Support Services need to be located within the state of Florida or just within US borders?
8. The RFI mentions both Service Desk and Call Center. Is there a need for both Service Desk (typically internal employee/users and technical or IT related issues) and Call Center (typically client/customer facing for various questions or information or for general information: hours of operation, directions, etc related questions) support? If so, can you please provide more detail into the types of users that would be calling for the different types of support?
We visualize this as a Tier 1 call center/service desk answering questions related to login, password reset, and basic answers to typical help desk questions. FDOE will provide Tier 2/3 support.
As used in this RFI, the term ‘Service Desk’ refers to the function within ITIL that is the single point of contact for the user in dealing with problems related to those IT services anticipated to be part of this effort. The user may be internal or external to DOE.
9. Would the DOE be providing the Incident Management system for tracking tickets or would the Vendor need to provide this toolset?
The vendor would provide
10. Do you currently have a knowledgebase and what is the state of current documentation within the knowledgebase?
There is no knowledge base for the new systems under development
11. What will be the duration of any contract awarded in response to a competitive solicitation for a call center/service desk to support all end users of RTTT systems and applications?
We are focused on seven systems requiring Tier 1 support. This may become an annual program with applicable renewals.
12. What will be the required hours of operation for the call center/service desk? See answer to #6
13. What systems and applications will the service desk be required to support?
We are considering seven programs: CPALMS, FAIR, Item Bank and Test Platform, eIPEP, SSO, Classroom Enrollment Tool and Formative Assessments & Lesson Study Toolkits in Reading 14. What is the number of calls anticipated during period of performance, broken down by:
a. Weekly, monthly, and annually TBD
b. Peak and off-peak hours TBD
15. What is the anticipated average call duration?
Unknown but likely less than 5 minutes dealing with login, password reset, short response on performance, and basic answers on standard application functionality prior to passing to Tier 2/3 support
16. What is the anticipated number of end users to be supported?
K-12 Teachers, Students and some supporting staff in excess of 2 million but unlikely to vary significantly based on the program.
17. What is the anticipated skill set and knowledge level of the end users to be supported? Depends on the program, most will be teachers or faculty that have a basic understanding of the tools they will be using, but in some cases it might be a student or parent asking a question.
18. Will the vendor be required to provide a knowledge management system? Is there any information available for inclusion in the knowledge management system?
The vendor will be required to provide a knowledge management database (KMDB). The initial information for the KMDB would be provided by FDOE; however the vendor would be expected to add items and topics over time.
19. Will the vendor be required to provide any on-site services, such as for hardware failures? If no, who will calls be escalated to?
No, all Tier 2/3 support will be provided by FDOE
20. Is the expected user base that requires support in Tallahassee or statewide? Statewide
21. What is the approximate number of end-users? (100? 5,000?) ~2 million
22. What other agencies besides FLDOE might participate in this potential procurement? None
23. Other than Spanish and Creole, what are FLDOE’s preferred alternate languages?
Support for languages other than English, Spanish and Creole is not required; however, it is possible that some callers might speak Chinese, Vietnamese or Japanese as a first language 24. Helpdesk Product
a. Does FLDOE have an existing helpdesk product that the winning proponent is expected to use?
No
b. Does FLDOE expect the vendor to integrate with FLDOE’s helpdesk product? No
c. If FLDOE and the vendor are to use the same instance of a helpdesk product, does FLDOE prefer a SaaS based solution?
This would prove useful.
25. Outsourcing
a. Does FLDOE outsource any of its existing infrastructure? Yes, North West Regional Data Center
b. If FLDOE outsources any of their infrastructure, will the vendor be required to interface with the outsourcing company on helpdesk tickets?
26. Supported Products
a. What COTS software products are to be supported? See question 3
b. What custom software products are to be supported? See question 3
c. Will training on any custom software be provided to the winning proponent? Yes
27. Data Retention:
a. Does FLDOE have any rules surrounding data-retention? Yes
b. Will data retention rules apply to the winning proponent? Yes
28. Remote Access
a. Does FLDOE have a corporate remote-access product already? No
b. If FLDOE does not have a remote-access product, can the vendor include one in their offering as an option?
Yes
29. Please provide three months of ACD data. Not available
30. Please describe the quality of the CMDB to be able to do business impact analysis and prioritization.
N/A
31. Please provide the data model of the CMDB. N/A
32. Is a fail-over Service Desk required (for business continuity and disaster recovery)? No
33. When would FLDOE prefer to start the outsource helpdesk relationship? July 1, 2014
34. What does FLDOE expect in a transition period? Continuous support to users.
35. Do you have an ITSM practice in place? No
36. What are your current SLAs?
Vendors should recommend service desk SLAs appropriate to such areas as: time to answer, hold times, first call resolution, etc.
37. What is the current support staff size for: a. Tier 1 -
b. Tier 2 - c. Tier 3 –
Data is not available as all systems are not yet in production 38. What are the requirements for user self-service?
TBD, however, vendors could suggest options for Tier 0/FAQ. 39. What are the requirements for an online knowledge base?
We do not yet have an online knowledge base 40. What are the requirements for a service catalog?
TBD
41. To what extent can the use of translation services be used? To the extent that the user’s needs are met timely and effectively 42. What is the expected ticket volume for Tier 1 per day and per month?
TBD as all systems are not yet in production
43. What is the expected ticket volume for Tier 2 per day and per month? FLDOE will provide Tier 2/Tier 3 support
44. What is the expected ticket volume for Tier 3 per day and per month? FLDOE will provide Tier 2/Tier 3 support
45. What is the current ticket volume for Tier 1 per day and per month? TBD as all systems are not yet in production
46. What is the current ticket volume for Tier 2 per day and per month? See 43 above
47. What is the current ticket volume for Tier 3 per day and per month? See 44 above
48. What is the split between hardware and software related calls? TBD as all systems are not yet in production
49. We typically provide reports on a monthly basis to indicate the effort expended and point out sources of incidents within our client’s infrastructure. Will reports of that nature be required? Yes, at a minimum reports relative to SLA compliance will be required.
50. Are there specific metrics that FLDOE wishes to use aside from the speed of answering? Yes, to be developed jointly between the Department and vendor.
51. The RFI response requires the disclosure by the vendor to DOE of information about the internal workings of the call center, such as training manuals, pricing structure, etc. This information is proprietary in nature and we would not want it to be made available to to other parties outside DOE without our permission. What guarantees will the DOE provide to ensure that our RFI response will not be made available to third parties?
The Department takes its public records responsibilities as provided under Chapter 119, F.S., and Article I, Section 24 of the Florida Constitution, very seriously. If a vendor considers any portion of the documents, data or records submitted in response to this RFI to be confidential, trade secret or otherwise not subject to disclosure pursuant to Chapter 119, F.S., the Florida Constitution or other authority, the vendor must clearly mark and identify in its information those portions which are confidential, trade secret or otherwise exempt. Vendors must also simultaneously provide the Department with a separate redacted copy of its information. This redacted copy shall contain the Department’s RFI name, number, and the name of the Respondent on the cover, and shall be clearly titled “Redacted Copy.” The Redacted Copy shall be provided to the Department at the same time the vendor submits its Reply to the RFI and must only exclude or obliterate those exact portions which are claimed confidential, proprietary, or trade secret.
The vendor shall be responsible for defending its determination that the redacted portions of its information are confidential, trade secret or otherwise not subject to disclosure. Further, the vendor shall protect, defend, and indemnify the Department for any and all claims arising from or relating to the vendors determination that the redacted portions of its information are confidential, proprietary, trade secret or otherwise not subject to disclosure.
If Respondent fails to submit a Redacted Copy with its Reply, the Department is authorized to produce the entire documents, data or records submitted by Respondent in answer to a public records request for these records.
This RFI will not result in a contract with the Department. Therefore, it is not subject to a challenge pursuant to Section 120.57, F.S.
