ECO Enterprise Service Desk (ESD) Consolidated Effort - RFI (VA-27-00011677)
Sources Sought from the Department of Veterans Affairs. Due Oct 21, 2026, 10:00 AM (UTC-4), 3 days left.
| Title as posted | DE01--ECO Enterprise Service Desk (ESD) Consolidated Effort - RFI (VA-27-00011677) |
|---|---|
| Solicitation number | 36C10B27Q0035 |
| Agency | Department of Veterans Affairs |
| Office | Technology Acquisition Center NJ (36C10B) |
| Notice type | Sources Sought |
| Set-aside | None |
| Trade (NAICS) | Computer Systems Design Services (541512) |
| Product or service code | DE01 |
| Posted | Oct 7, 2026 |
| Response deadline | Oct 21, 2026, 10:00 AM (UTC-4) (3 days left) |
Official notice and attachments
Description
Request for Information Synopsis Enterprise Service Desk: Integrated Service Delivery Model with Independent Billing and Outcome Oversight 1.0 RFI Synopsis Narrative Background and Purpose The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), Office of Information & Technology (OIT), Enterprise Command Operations (ECO) is issuing a Request for Information (RFI) to conduct market research supporting a planned future acquisition strategy for Enterprise Service Desk (ESD) support and its associated Contact Center Infrastructure (CCI).
VA currently operates ESD Tier 0/1 support and CCI as two separate prime contracts under a Multi-Vendor Service Provider (MVSP) model, where the CCI vendor produces independent Service Level Agreement (SLA) compliance reporting and conducts formal quality assurance oversight of the Tier 1 vendor's performance. VA is exploring whether and how Tier 1 agent services and CCI platform management could be brought together under an integrated service delivery model, while determining what functions, if any, should remain organizationally independent from the delivery contractor to preserve objective performance, quality, and billing oversight.
VA has not determined the appropriate scope or structure of any such independent function and is seeking industry input on whether independence is necessary, which functions require it, and the most effective means of providing it. The primary purpose of this RFI is to hear from industry on how an integrated delivery model would work in practice, i.e., how it would be structured, transitioned, and operated and to use that input, together with the Rough Order of Magnitude (ROM) estimates requested below, to inform the resulting Performance Work Statement (PWS) and VA's decisions on scope, sequencing, and commercial structure.
VA recognizes that consolidation may not be the right answer in every respect, and industry input that identifies where a combined model would be impractical, along with the reasoning behind that view, is just as valuable to VA as input on how to make consolidation work. This RFI is not a solicitation and does not commit VA to a particular acquisition approach. One specific issue on which VA would welcome industry input, particularly in the context of a combined model, is how outcomes should be classified if VA adopts outcome-based, automation-linked, or gainshare pricing.
Under those pricing structures, the classification of individual contacts (e.g., AI-resolved vs. human-handled, genuinely deflected vs. merely relabeled, successfully automated vs. escalated) becomes the basis for what VA pays. If agent services and CCI are combined, VA wants to understand how a vendor would ensure that the entity performing the work and the entity classifying/reporting the outcome of that work don't create a structural incentive to classify ambiguous or borderline contacts in whichever direction favors billing.
VA recognizes that transparent data feeds alone may not fully resolve this on their own, since the vendor typically controls the metadata structure, the correlation logic between systems, and the judgment calls in ambiguous cases. This lines up with feedback VA has already received from industry: multiple respondents to prior VA market research independently flagged the "AI-attempted-then-escalated" correlation and the "resolving tier" determination as fields that are self-reported, consequential to billing, and not easily produced by either vendor alone under the current structure.
Given that feedback, VA wants industry's perspective on whether some form of independent validation of billing-relevant outcomes would be useful under a combined model, and if so, how narrowly or broadly it should be scoped. For example, whether it should focus solely on billing/outcome validation, or whether it makes more sense operationally to fold in general quality assurance scoring and day-to-day SLA compliance reporting as well.
VA has not settled this question and is not assuming an independent function is necessary at all; VA's own data feeds, combined with automated QA tooling already in production, may prove sufficient on their own. This RFI invites industry input to help VA define the scope of the issue without presupposing a particular outcome. Strategic Direction VA's objective is not simply to combine two existing statements of work.
It is to move the ESD operating model from a labor- and channel-centric structure to one organized around demand elimination, unified customer experience, and outcome-based accountability. Specifically, VA is seeking industry's perspective on an operating model that: Eliminates demand rather than optimizing contact handling. The strategic objective is not reducing cost per contact but reducing the volume of contacts that require human involvement in the first place, through AI-assisted self-service, proactive communication, automated fulfillment, and FboNotice-cause elimination.
Presents a unified, channel-agnostic experience to the End User. The distinction between phone, chat, portal, and other channels should be invisible to the employee; the service environment, not the caller, determines whether AI, automation, knowledge, or a human agent is the appropriate resolution path. Treats AI and automation as the operating model, not an add-on.
The relevant question is which categories of work should never require a human, and how the contractor is held contractually accountable for progressively moving categories of work off human agents. Realigns commercial incentives from resources consumed to outcomes achieved, while recognizing that outcome-based and gainshare pricing models raise the stakes on how outcomes are classified and who classifies them.
Current Environment VA's current environment processes approximately 125,000 150,000 contacts per month across voice, chat, SMS, and self-service channels, supports roughly 600,000 End Users and 900 applications, and already has voice biometric verification, IV
The description continues in the official notice.
About the buyer
The Department of Veterans Affairs awarded $84.2 billion in contracts in the last 12 months; its biggest suppliers were Optum Public Sector Solutions, Inc., Mckesson Corporation and Triwest Healthcare Alliance Corp. See what VA is buying now.