HEALTH CARE FINANCING ADMINISTRATION OFFICE OF ACQUISITION AND GRANTS 6325 SECURITY BOULEVARD, BALTO., MD., 21207 340 EHR Bldg.

R -- BENEFICIARY INFORMATION, EDUCATION AND MARKETING STRATEGY SOL HCFA-RFP-95-054/MK POC Mark Keller, Contract Specialist, (410) 966-9994. The Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) is seeking to contract with a qualified small business firm under Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) Code 4899 to provide Communication Services. This is a request for a solicitation to procure a Beneficiary Information, Education and Marketing Strategy to support HCFA's planned Coordinated Open Enrollment/Competitive Pricing Demonstration for Medicare. Through this procurement, HCFA intends to: (1) Develop a marketing/public relations strategy to reach all beneficiaries in the demonstration market area and to inform beneficiaries of the enrollment process and new plan choices, (2) Develop a strategy for beneficiary education and understanding about increased options under Medicare, and (3) develop strategies and materials which will enable beneficiaries to choose between new and different types of insurance plans in an open enrollment process. The Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) is planning a number of initiatives to parallel recent innovations and processes found in private sector insurance. The primary objective of these initiatives is to offer beneficiaries a wider range of managed care health plan options, and to foster a more competitive health plan payment model. To accomplish these objectives, HCFA is planning a demonstration which will use a coordinated open enrollment process to offer beneficiaries a wider range of insurance options, while using a competitive pricing system as an alternative to the current payment methods. This procurement will support this demonstration during its multiple phases by developing a beneficiary information, education and marketing strategy. This strategy will be used to inform and educate beneficiaries involved in the demonstrations, which will be phased-in in multiple sites. As a first phase of this coordinated open enrollment competitive pricing demonstration, Mathematica Policy Research (under contract to HCFA's Office of Research and Demonstrations) is currently developing an interim demonstration program to develop and test new health plan options for Medicare beneficiaries. Materials and strategies developed under this contract may be or may not be tested in these first-phase sites. During the second phase, these new plan options will be integrated to form the larger, coordinated open enrollment/competitive pricing demonstration. This larger demonstration, undertaken at multiple sites, will offer these new managed care options to Medicare beneficiaries in one of two possible demonstration models: (1) a voluntary open enrollment program or, (2) a mandatory coordinated open enrollment program combined with a competitive pricing system. Materials and strategies, developed under this procurement, will be implemented during this second phase. Which demonstration will actually be undertaken will depend on whether additional legislative authorities are obtained by HCFA. When completed under this contract, the products of this beneficiary information, education and marketing strategy should be detailed enough so as to be immediately implementable by either HCFA or HCFA's contractor. The contractor under this task should prepare details and mock-ups of all proposed marketing strategies, communication mediums, materials to be used, methods of pre-testing materials and presentations, etc. While there may be some research components involved in the development of this strategy, the goal of this procurement is the actual production of sample materials and strategies which can be immediately used in the demonstration sites. Firms bidding on this contract will be evaluated both on their proposed technical approach, and on their experience in developing marketing strategies related to this work. Requests for the RFP must be in writing and must be received by the above office within 15 days of this notice. No telephone requests will be honored. The RFP will be available on a first come first serve basis until supply is exhausted. See Numbered Note 1. (0110)

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