Inactive

Equipment rental and setting up services for the New Embassy Compound (NEC) Ground- Breaking Ceremony in Hanoi, Vietnam. This is organized in honor of the High Level USG Principals Visit in 14 - 16 Ap... Equipment rental and setting up services for the New Embassy Compound (NEC) Ground- Breaking Ceremony in Hanoi, Vietnam. This is organized in honor of the High Level USG Principals Visit in 14 - 16 April 2023. Security concerns prohibit sufficient advanced notification of VIP travel to allow for sufficient time to conduct full and open competition. The Department of State can only communicate with the staff at Posts abroad when authorization is given due to security concerns. They have an extremely short turnaround time when authorization has been granted for negotiations to be finalized with both the local vendors and Posts before the actual VIP visit occurs. Unique requirements for communication facility support are under severe time limitations and always a determining factor in the selection process as its capacity to be augmented to the unique requirements necessary to support certain High Level USG Principals. Security and logistics are the Department of State’s primary considerations when procuring the services for NEC Groundbreaking Ceremony set up and other logistics arrangements. The Department of State must be able to provide a safe and secure environment for VIP visitors. Frequently VIP visits are not announced or confirmed in sufficient time to conduct a competition, creating an urgent and compelling need. At other times, the security requirements and/or requirements of the host country government limit the acquisition to one or a small number of predetermined service providers. Post received notice about the VIP visit on March 29 with a very limited information on the visit agenda including the NEC groundbreaking ceremony. The ceremony is planned to take place on April 15 but no detailed scope of work was provided. Post had to prepare a solicitation package to include a draft RFQ and an IGCE of about USD20,000. According to FAR 5.10(a)(2) and FAR 13.106-1(c) the acquisition with IGCE of USD15,000-USD25,000 requires an unclassified notice in public or by any appropriate electronic means for at least 10 days, but in consideration of extremely short time from Mar 29 to April 15, totally 17 days, to process all the procedures from preparing the solicitation with review and approval, public posting, technical evaluation, award determination and then site arrangement, the required 10 days public posting is absolutely impossible. This urgent requirement obviously limits Post’s ability to conduct a full and open competition in public solicitation posting.