Responding to an Invitation to Submit a Quote

If a solicitation has an Open status, then you will follow the standard process for submitting a quote on an open solicitation (see "Submitting a Quote on a Solicitation").

Once a solicitation is Closed or Awarded, typically vendors who do not already have a response submitted on the solicitation are unable to submit a new quote for the solicitation. However, you may contact the Contracting Officer of the solicitation to request permission to submit a quote on the solicitation, despite the closed or awarded status of the solicitation. It is important to note that it is at the discretion of the CO on whether or not they will issue an invitation to allow a vendor to submit a response once the solicitation has closed or is fully awarded.

Below are key items to note about the invitation to submit a quote process:

• If the CO issues an invitation to you to respond to a solicitation, VIPR will send you an email with the invitation informing you that you can respond to the specific solicitation.
• You MUST use the VIPR-generated blank, work-in-progress quote that is in your My Quotes table in the vendor application to respond to the solicitation when you receive an invitation. The work-in-progress quote will be labeled as "In Negotiations," which will allow you to submit your quote.
• As the case for any quote submittal, your quote will NOT be considered as "submitted" until you complete the Quote a Solicitation wizard to fully submit the quote.
• After you submit your quote, if you have changes to your quote, you can resubmit the quote if you are "In Negotiations." For your resubmittal, ensure you include ALL of the resources that you want on your quote—even if you only have updates to a few of your resources.
• The CO DOES have the option to rescind your invitation up until the time when you submit your quote. If the CO rescinds the invitation, you will receive an email notice about the rescinded invitation, and you will be unable to submit your quote.
• For vendors who receive awards through this special invitation, their resources will be at the bottom of DPLs regardless of the vendors' pricing or advantages (CBA points or business status). However, once the vendors receive a rollover modification or resource type correction modification, the vendors' rankings on the DPL will be re-calculated with the other vendors with agreements on the solicitation.
• If a vendor already has an existing agreement on the solicitation, but is given an opportunity to submit a new response on the same solicitation, then that vendor may have multiple agreements on the same solicitation.

Business Rules for Submitting a Quote

When submitting (or resubmitting a quote), you should be aware of the business rules that will be applied.

• VIPR will not do a VIPR/SAM validation check at the time when you submit or re-submit a quote, but VIPR will do a validation check at the time of award to ensure (1) your SAM record is active and (2) your company name, company DBA, company address, and mailing address in VIPR matches the company information in SAM. If these two criteria are not met, then you will be ineligible for receiving an award. For more information, see "The VIPR/SAM Interconnection".
• If you update your resource information after you have submitted a quote, you will need to resubmit the quote to include those changes in the quote. Remember, you MUST include all of the resources that you want included on the quote, not just the resource you updated.
• You can update your resource information and resubmit at any time as long as the CO has put you "In Negotiations" in order to allow you to resubmit your quote.
• If you update your company information after you have submitted a quote, you will NOT need to resubmit the quote. The updates will automatically be added to your offer until the solicitation is awarded, just click on the View Quote.PDF to regenerate the quote and see your changes.
  
  HOWEVER, if you made updates to company name, company DBA, company address, and mailing address in your SAM record, you MUST first use the "View/Import from SAM" button to get your VIPR information in sync with SAM or you will be ineligible to receive an award. Once you import the information, you will not need to resubmit your quote, because the changes will automatically be added to your offer—just click on the View Quote.PDF to regenerate the quote and see your changes. Remember that it takes SAM several business days to process your changes before those changes will be available to import from SAM into VIPR
• If you have not completed your Reps & Certs information online in the System for Agreement Management (SAM) at https://www.sam.gov, then you MUST do so in order for your quote to be considered complete.
• Only one response can be submitted for a solicitation; VIPR will use the vendor’s last response submitted as the response on record and will override any previous responses.
• If you wish to associate a EFT with a quote, you can do so in the Submit a Quote wizard.
• If you did not originally include a EFT on your quote, you can associate a EFT to your quote in the Submit a Quote wizard during a resubmittal of the quote.
• You cannot enter new EFT values through the Submit a Quote wizard; for any new EFT values, you must first enter them in the Edit Company Information wizard before they will be available to select during the quote submittal process.

To submit a quote through an invitation:

1. From the Home page, click on the My Quotes tab to find the blank, New Submission in Progress quote with the status of "In Negotiations."
2. In the table, in the Action column for the solicitation, click on the Play icon () to start the Quote a Solicitation wizard.
3. In the View Solicitation step, click on the View the Complete Solicitation button to view the solicitation details, and then click the Continue button to proceed to the next step.
4. In the Select Resources step, click on the check box(es) to select the resources you wish to use for submitting a quote on the solicitation.

NOTES:
- You will receive a warning message if you do not have any resources that qualify for the solicitation. If this is the case, you can either click the Update button to review your resource data for your current resources or click the Add New Resource button to add a new resource that may qualify for the solicitation.

- If you have a resource that may seem like it should qualify for the solicitation, but the resource is suspended on an agreement for a different solicitation, then the resource is considered to be associated with that agreement and will NOT be available to submit on a quote for another solicitation.

Special Note for Generic resources:
A generic resource will qualify for ALL generic solicitations.

• If you click the Update button to view your resource information:

1. The Manage Your Resources wizard opens and you can view and/or edit your resource information. You must complete this wizard to save any changes you make to your resource.
2. From this wizard, click the Go Back to Quote button to go back to the Quote a Solicitation wizard.
3. Go to Step 5.

• If you click the Add New Resource button to add a new resource for the solicitation quote:

1. The Manage Your Resources wizard opens and you can add your resource information. You must complete this wizard to save the new resource you added.
2. From this wizard, click the Go Back to Quote button to go back to the Quote a Solicitation wizard.
3. Go to Step 5.

5. In the Select Resources step, click on the check box(es) to select the resources you wish to use for submitting a quote on the solicitation.
6. Click the Save and Continue button.
7. In the Add Rates step, click on the Set Rates button to select the dispatch center and set the rates for each resource.

IMPORTANT If your resource qualifies for more than one resource category type within the same resource group (i.e. VIN ABC123 qualifies as both an Engine Type 3 and an Engine Type 4) and you wish to submit both resource category types in your quote to the same solicitation, you MUST select the same Dispatch Center for both types.

Special Note for Generic resources:
For information about the Optional Rate fields, refer to D2 in the generic solicitation PDF.

8. Once you have set the rates and the dispatch center for each resource, click the Continue button.

NOTE: Notice the counter at the bottom of the wizard in this step, which indicates how many of the resources you have completed the rates and dispatch center information for.

9. In the Review Quote step, view the information you entered for your quote, and then click the Continue button.

NOTE: Also in this step, you can click on the View PDF button to view a PDF containing all of the information for your quote.

10. In the Sign Quote step, read the quote signature statement and if you agree to the statement, select the 'I Agree' check box.

11. Click the Submit button to submit your signed quote.

Your quote is submitted to VIPR. In addition to the confirmation you receive in the wizard, you will receive an e-mail notification of the successful submittal, as well.

NOTE:If you have submitted a quote for a Heavy Equipment with Water or Water Handling solicitation, then your e-mail confirmation will include a zip file with inspection forms for each of your resources. Some of the fields on the inspection forms will be pre-populated with VIPR data for your resources as captured through your quote. You will need WinZip to open the InspectionForms.zip. It is recommended that you print the inspection forms and take them to your scheduled inspection.

 

IMPORTANT VIPR will treat your quote as any other quote submitted on the solicitation with one exception: for vendors who are submitting quotes through an invitation, if they receive awards for their resources, those resources will be at the bottom of the Dispatch Priority Lists (DPL) regardless of the vendors' pricing or advantages (CBA points and business statuses). Only through a rollover modification or resource type correction modification will the vendors' pricing and advantages be re-calculated with the other vendors on the same solicitation for the DPL ranking.

 

IMPORTANT Only one response can be used for the solicitation, therefore, VIPR will use the vendor’s last response submitted as the response on record and will override any previous responses. This will NOT affect a vendor's existing agreement on the same solicitation.

 

IMPORTANT If you have completed your representations and certifications online using SAM, then your quote is complete.

 

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