R -- Telephone and/or Communication Services

AS HUD IS CURRENTLY ON A CONTINUOUS RESOLUTION, THE CONTRACT AWARD FOR THIS PROCUREMENT WILL BE SUBJECT TO THE AVAILABILITY OF FUNDS. Please read thoroughly - The Department of Housing & Urban Development (HUD), Office of Single Family (SF) plans to issue a Limited SB 8(a) Competition, Request for Proposal (RFP) in accordance with FAR Parts 15 & 19 to obtain a SF multi-channel contact center solution to resolve information requests from the general public and the housing industry. Single Family has consolidated its client management tasks into a single CMC. All contacts, regardless of client type (lender or public) or communication channel (telephone, email, fax, letter, message board and chat); have been directed to the new CMC via a single toll-free number, a single email address, and a single fax number. The current volume of contacts is approximately 50,000 per month. Acting as the "bridge" between Single Family Housing and its client, the Contractor shall perform all appropriate client management functions. It is Single Family's intent to create a national multi-channel client management center to act as the first line of response to all Single Family clients. As a performance based Contract, it is the Contractor's responsibility to create a unique proposal to meet the Single Family's client management needs. Interested Potential SB 8(a) Contractors shall be able to perform the following tasks in support of the CMC: 1. Provide the American public and the FHA lending industry with easily accessible, consistent, timely, and professional responses to their inquiries via their preferred method of communication. 2. Operate a fully managed multi-channel contact center solution using the existing Client Management system - RightNow Technology. 3. Sustain access to state-of-the-art technology that is scalable to meet current and future requirements. 4. Utilize customer satisfaction and programmatic surveys in order to measure and control the delivery of FHA programs and services to meet the evolving needs of citizens. 5. Operate the comprehensive knowledge base (RightNow) that shall contain the breadth of Single Family policies and procedures that is available on-line to approved Single Family business clients. 6. Update and maintain the knowledge base so that all policies and procedures are kept accurate and up to date. 7. Recruit, hire and maintain a trained group of Customer Service Representatives that have the capability of handling both general and technical FHA and mortgage finance issues. 8. Establish training and monitoring program that ensures accurate and consistent responses to the thousands of potential questions from industry clients and the general public. 9. Ensure the scalability of the multi-channel contact center structure and software to absorb significant shifts in the volume of contacts. 10. Assist in the promotion of new or revised programs and services to HUD's clients. 11. Establish the technical/IT infrastructure to: a. Transfer and integrate FHA case specific data within the Client Management software b. Record all telephone contacts and integrate them into the Client Management software c. Allow live, remote monitoring of ongoing calls d. Allow real-time remote monitoring of the multi-channel contact center's incoming call queue e. Provide a warm transfer of escalated contacts to the appropriate Single Family call group *Interested potential 8(a) Contractors are encouraged to participate in the pre-proposal conference, which date & time will be determined in the RFP. Once again, this will be a negotiated FAR Parts 15 & 19, Limited 8(a) Small Business competition and has been set-aside for businesses under the North American Industry Classification System of 519190, All Other Information Services. HUD anticipates the award to be a performance-based, Firm Fixed Price (FFP) and Volume Banding Fixed Price (VBFP) structure contract with the overall period of performance not exceeding 60 months, including the Transition Period, Base Period, and all Option Periods, if exercised. The RFP anticipated release date will be on or about December 20, 2006, and it is anticipated that a contract award will be made on or about April 30, 2007, based on the best value to the Government. The RFP will only be provided through HUD's web page as discussed below. Interested parties may obtain a copy of the solicitation by accessing the following web page: http://www.hud.gov/offices/cpo/contract.cfm HUD posts all required notices of its contracting opportunities on its Internet Contracting Opportunities site at the above website. Potential offerors who download copies of solicitations from HUD's Contracting Opportunities site will NOT automatically receive any amendments to those solicitations. You are advised to check back frequently to see if HUD has issued any amendments to solicitations you have obtained. All amendments will be posted on, and may be downloaded from, HUD's Contracting Opportunities site.